Finding Her Place
by inkNpaperXmusic00
Summary: Arielle Potter discovered only a year ago that her brother is the most famous wizards in history. She finally has a family, adoptive and real. This is her story. First in "The Shadows Behind the Smile" series. Rating is just in case.
1. Prologue

Within the confines of the house, everything was dark and silent, save for the sounds of deep, sleepy breathing. The warm night air just added to the dreamlike atmosphere, relaxing the muscles of the Burrow's residents as the night wore on. The atmosphere, as it was wont to do in that home, changed abruptly as the wooden steps creaked under the weight of three people making their badly-concealed way down the stairs.

It was this atmosphere change that woke Arielle Potter up at the ungodly hour of three in the morning. Still clinging to her already forgotten dream, she turned over and buried her face further under the pillow, trying to ignore the sounds of footsteps on the stairs and sink back into her dreams. She gave up her attempts when the source of the noises stopped outside her room and began a whispered argument; shoving the blankets off her body, Arielle tiptoed to the door and listened to her adoptive brothers bickering.

"What if he really doesn't want to come? If we get there and he just tells us to shove off?" That was Ron. Git. Arielle already knew who he was talking about and they hadn't even mentioned his name.

"Come off it, Ron, he wouldn't, especially not after we go all the way out there," came a second voice.

"Well, he might," came a very similar voice to the second.

"But then we'd just nick his trunk—"

"Maybe his owl—"

"Definitely his owl."

"And tell him to get in before we leave him there to rot in that house," both voices finished together. That was Fred and George. Bigger gits. Arielle had to admit they had a point, though: Harry would rather be kidnapped by the twins than stay at his aunt and uncle's house any day.

"Plus, his sister lives here," Fred said.

"Yeah, who wouldn't want to spend extra time around Arielle?" George asked. The humour in his voice caused Arielle to open the door to the bedroom she shared with Ginny and glare at the tall redhead.

Despite the large size difference between the brothers and Arielle, all three boys shrunk under her glare. Fred and George recovered quickly, leaving Ron to shake in his boots—or slippers, as the case may be—by his lonesome.

Grinning like the Cheshire cat, Fred whispered, "Go lie down, you're having a nightmare."

"To right, I am," Arielle replied scathingly. "I wake up really early in the morning only to see your smiling face first thing." She tilted her head and grinned sarcastically at him, batting her eyelashes innocently and laughing on the inside.

"Touché," George said. "Listen, we're going on a rescue mission. Go to sleep and we'll be back before you wake up again."

"Uh-uh," said Arielle, shaking her head, "you're going to get Harry. I'm going with you." She folded her arms across her chest and stared them down, daring them to argue with her.

"Okay, fine," Ron said immediately. "Can we just go? The longer we stand here the more likely it is we'll get caught." Fred and George stood a moment longer before shrugging and sneaking further down the stairs. Arielle followed closely with Ron bringing up the rear.

The quartet crept out of the house and into the garage where the Weasleys' Ford Anglia was parked. Fred slid into the driver's seat and put the car in neutral so the other three could roll it out of the garage using the slight incline and sheer manual force, choosing the slight exertion over starting the engine within the echoing confines of the garage. Once the car was a good distance from its home, Ron, George, and Arielle clambered into the vehicle and situated themselves for the long journey ahead. Fred ignited the engine and started the car down the drive. Once there was a decent amount of open space in front of the Ford, Fred set the car up for a successful take off. Arielle folded her legs into a pretzel and watched the patchwork of land gliding beneath her, thankful for the comfy sweatpants she wore as she thought of the drive/flight they had in store.

In about an hour the unfamiliar landscape of Little Whinging was spread out under the group as they made their slow descent into the sleeping town. After finally scoping out the Dursleys' house, they pulled up to the window that had to belong to Harry, judging from the bars on it. Arielle leaned around Ron to get a better view of the inside. Her anger flared as she noticed the padlock on his snowy owl's cage and the cat flap on the door. Through the open window, Ron rattled the bars in the hopes of waking Harry.

"Stop it," was the distinct muttering that came from the sleeping Harry. Arielle giggled and he continued, believing it was all part of his dream. "Leave me alone…cut it out…I'm trying to sleep." Finally opening his eyes, Harry looked over at the window, taking in Ron and Arielle's faces staring back at him. He whispered something that looked like, "_Ron!_" before opening the window so that their communication wouldn't wake his aunt and uncle.

"Ron, Arielle, how did you—What the–?" he spluttered, his jaw dropping when he really noticed what was going on.

The twins were grinning at Harry's shocked face. "All right, Harry?" George asked.

"What's been going on? Why haven't you been answering my letters?" asked Ron quickly. "I've asked you to stay about twelve times—"

"Yeah," Arielle interjected, "and then Mr. Weasley came home saying that you'd gotten an official warning for using magic around Muggles—"

"It wasn't me—and how did he know?"

"He works for the Ministry," Ron explained, not seeming to think this information was important. "You _know_ we're not supposed to do spells outside school—"

"You should talk." Harry looked pointedly at the floating car.

"This doesn't _really_ count," Arielle said. "We've just borrowed this one."

"It's Dad's, _we_ didn't enchant it. But doing magic in front of those Muggles you live with—"

"I told you, I didn't—but it'll take too long to explain now—look, can you tell them at Hogwarts that the Dursleys have locked me up and won't let me come back, and obviously I can't magic myself out, because the Ministry'll think that's the second spell I've done in three days, so—"

"Relax, Harry," Arielle said. "We've come to take you home with us."

"Stop gibbering," Ron added, which was unnecessary as Harry had already shut up.

"But you can't magic me out either—"

"We don't need to. You forget who I've got with me," Ron said, gesturing to the front seat with his head and grinning.

Fred, who had been uncharacteristically silent through the whole explanation, threw Harry a length of rope while making sure he kept at least the end of it in the car. "Tie that around the bars."

Harry did as he said. "If the Dursleys wake up, I'm dead," he reminded them as Fred revved the car.

"Don't worry, and stand back," Fred said. Harry moved into the shadows as Fred drove the car as far away from the house as the rope let him and revved the engine louder until suddenly the car shot straight up when the bars had become detached. Ron hoisted the bars into the car. Once they were secure, Fred returned to the window where Harry stood.

"Get in," Ron said hurriedly.

"But all my Hogwarts stuff—my wand—my broomstick—" Harry stammered.

"Where is it?"

"Locked in the cupboard under the stairs, and I can't get out of this room—"

"No problem," said George from the front seat. "Out of the way, Harry."

The twins climbed out of the car and through the window to Harry's room. Once they were in the shadows by the door, undoubtedly picking the lock in the Muggle fashion, they began to talk to Harry, telling him to hand out anything he needs from his room to Ron and Arielle while they got his trunk. The door swung open and Harry whispered a warning to Fred and George that Arielle couldn't hear, then they were gone into the main part of the house.

Harry dashed around grabbing items he'd need for the Burrow as well as his return to Hogwarts and passing them out to Ron, who in turn handed them to Arielle so she could stow them properly and leave enough room for three people in the backseat. Once that was done, he left to help the twins with his trunk.

Finally, the boys reached the landing, hauling the trunk and out of breath. They carried the trunk to the window; Fred climbed out first so he could help Ron pull, pushing Arielle out of the way. She glared at the back of his head as he directed the trunk through the window.

"A bit more… One good push—" Fred panted, trying his hardest to pull the trunk into the car.

She heard the sound of shoulders hitting the trunk before Arielle was joined by a trunk in the backseat of the Ford. Once it was situated, George climbed through the window and whispered, "Okay, let's go."

Harry had gotten as far as the windowsill when his owl, not one to be left behind, screeched to draw his attention. Unfortunately, it drew the attention of Harry and Arielle's recently sleeping uncle as well.

"THAT RUDDY OWL!" Arielle could hear him from the car, he shouted so loud.

"I've forgotten Hedwig!" Harry jumped back down and tore across the room to Hedwig's cage. He had gotten her to the window, handed her to Ron—who, again, passed her off to Arielle, who glared at him—and climbed back up on the chest of drawers when his uncle hammered on the door and it flew open.

Vernon Dursley stood in the doorway for half a second before roaring like a wounded or angry wild animal and launching himself at Harry, grabbing him by the ankle.

Fred, George, Ron, and Arielle all reached out and, seizing Harry's arms, pulled as hard as they could to free him.

"Petunia! He's getting away! HE'S GETTING AWAY!"

The car's passengers all gave one enormous tug and Harry's ankle slid out of his uncle's grasp. He was in the car and slamming the door shut.

"Put your foot _down_, Fred!" Ron shouted, and the car jolted forward.

Harry opened the window and looked back at the Dursleys hanging from his window. "See you next summer!" he yelled. Everyone roared with laughter as Harry sat back, grinning widely. "Let Hedwig out. She can fly behind us. She hasn't had a chance to stretch her wings for ages."

George handed the hairpin to Arielle, who masterfully picked the lock, and, a moment later, the snowy owl was accompanying the Ford Anglia in the sky.

Ron, never being one for patience, immediately asked, "So—what's the story, Harry? What's been happening?"

Harry explained his entire situation, from Dobby to the violet pudding that had gotten him his official warning. The group discussed who could have been behind it, but they didn't think they'd ever really know.

"I'm glad we came to get you, anyway," Ron said after a while. "I was getting really worried when you didn't answer any of my letters. I thought it was Errol's fault at first—"

"Who's Errol?"

"He's the Weasley family owl. He's ancient; it's a little sad," Arielle said.

"Yeah, it wouldn't be the first time he'd collapsed on a delivery. So then I tried to borrow Hermes—"

"_Who_?"

"The owl Mum and Dad bought Percy when he was made prefect," Fred explained from the front.

"But Percy wouldn't lend him to me. Said he needed him."

"Percy's been acting very odd this summer," said a frowning George. "And he _has_ been sending a lot of letters and spending a load of time shut up in his room…. I mean, there's only so many times you can polish a prefect badge…. You're driving too far west, Fred," he added, and Fred changed course.

"Percy doesn't really need a reason to act oddly, though," Arielle stated, earning grins from the twins in the front.

"So, does your dad know you've got the car?" Harry asked, probably for the sake of conversation as the answer was obvious.

For the rest of the trip, the Weasleys and Arielle explained about Mr. Weasley's job and why his "tinkering" drove Mrs. Weasley up the wall. Pretty soon, the car was back at the main road.

"We'll be there in ten minutes…. Just as well, it's getting light…." George said. The car flew lower and lower, and soon the ground was made of little patches again.

"Touchdown!" Fred cheered as the car landed with a slight bump in the Burrow's front yard. Arielle, grinning, applauded as if he were an airplane pilot after a long flight. She opened the door the moment the car stopped and got out, stretching her legs after the long flight.

The boys were going over plans to get back in the house and explain Harry's appearance at the Burrow when Arielle noticed Mrs. Weasley march out of the house directly towards where the Ford Anglia was parked. Ron seemed to have noticed, too, because he had turned an interesting and rather unpleasant shade of green. Arielle considered hiding, but, deciding it would do her no good, she just steeled herself for the rage of the usually kind-faced woman walking from the place she'd come to call "home."

**A/N: Like it? Love it? Hate it? Don't care? Let me know. I've been dreaming up this huge series for years now, but now I've found somewhere to put it (which means I have a reason to actually write it =) )! This is just basically to show that even with another major person involved, I'm not changing major plot bunnies. Nearly all dialogue belongs solely to JKR, I just borrowed it.**

**I'm not sure when I'll update. Before anyone hunts me down, it's because I'm having surgery in two days (a.k.a. getting my wisdom teeth out; on my main characters birthday, I almost laughed in the dentist's office 'cause of that) and I don't know how long the antibiotics and stuff are going to mess with me because I've never had** **anesthesia before.**

**Sorry if that's a lame excuse. Reviews might motivate me *hint, hint*, but I still have three summer projects left and I go back in two weeks (eek!).**


	2. Chapter 1: Diagon Alley

Nearly two weeks after her participation in a late night rescue mission, Arielle was once again woken up much too early for her liking. It was about half past six when Mrs. Weasley burst into her and Ginny's room and opened the blinds in the windows, letting in a sufficient amount of light to rouse both girls from their previously peaceful sleep.

"Wake up, dears," Mrs. Weasley said in a voice far too loud to be decent at that hour of the morning. "We need to get an early start if we want to get all your supplies by noon."

"Mum!" Ginny groaned sitting halfway up. "Why noon?"

"Never you mind, Ginny. Just get ready, we'll have breakfast when you get downstairs," Mrs. Weasley said. "And don't go back to sleep," she added, glaring at Arielle who had rolled over and shoved her face into her pillow in an attempt to do just that.

Arielle mumbled something incomprehensible even to her own ears into her pillow and sat up, pushing her dark red curls back so she could see. Her hazel eyes searched out Ginny's brown ones; they silently debated whether the consequences of going back to sleep outweighed the benefits. The smell of food coming from three floors below finally won that battle and the two girls set about finding clothes and shoes.

After finally finding her grayish blue jeans, Arielle got dressed and brushed her hair back into a high ponytail, leaving her side swept fringe alone. Eyes still half closed with sleep, she made her way down the stairs and into the kitchen, hoping Ginny wouldn't knock something over between when she got down there and when the group left.

After a hurried breakfast, thankfully devoid of any Harry-induced accidents, everyone gathered around the fireplace and quickly used the Floo powder to get to the Leaky Cauldron.

Everyone, it appeared, but Harry.

"Where's Harry, Arielle?" Mr. Weasley asked her as she climbed out of the pub's fireplace and brushed soot off her already grey t-shirt.

"Isn't he here? He came through before I did," she replied, frowning slightly. "Unless…oh no, he choked on the ash! He probably fell out too soon." Her eyes went wide.

"So much easier, right Harry?" Ron said, stepping out of the fireplace behind Arielle. "Harry?"

Mr. Weasley wrung his hands worriedly. "He got out at the wrong grate, we think, Ron."

"How could he have? He said 'Diagon Alley,'" Ron rambled, obviously confused.

"Well, considering he was choking on a lot of hot ash when he said it, it probably wasn't clear enough for the Floo network," Arielle said, annoyed with Ron for not warning Harry about the Floo.

Once all of the Weasleys had made it through the grate, the worried crowd, led by the frantic Mrs. Weasley, set off in search of the missing Harry. About a third of the way between the beginning of the alley and Gringotts, Arielle saw what had to be the biggest man she'd ever seen walking towards the wizard bank accompanied by someone she couldn't see through the crowd. Fred and George, who were nearly a foot taller than her own four feet nine inches, recognized both the man and his companion.

"Look over there! It's Hagrid," Fred exclaimed.

"He's got Harry with him!" George shouted to the others. The Weasley brothers, Mr. Weasley, and Arielle all sprinted off towards the giant, wild looking man, leaving Mrs. Weasley and Ginny to run after them at a slower pace.

Arielle didn't bother to slow down as she ran into her brother and hugged him. "You idiot," she told him, but her smile gave her away.

"Let go, I can't breathe," Harry managed to get out, trying not to laugh at her mock annoyance. Arielle released him and he drew in a deep breath before turning to Mr. Weasley, who was panting.

"Harry," Mr. Weasley gasped, before gathering himself. "We _hoped_ you'd only gone one grate to far…." He mopped at the sweat glistening on his balding head. "Molly's frantic—she's coming now—" He turned to look for his wife.

"Where did you come out?" Ron asked

"Knockturn Alley," the man, Hagrid, answered grimly.

Arielle's eyes widened in shock, but the twins responded with, "_Excellent!_"

"We've never been allowed in," Ron said jealously.

"I should ruddy well think not," growled Hagrid.

At this point, Mrs. Weasley had arrived, dragging Ginny along behind her. Once Mrs. Weasley had cleaned Harry off and Mr. Weasley had repaired Harry's glasses, the large crowd that had formed on the stairs went as one into the bank.

"Hello. I'm Hermione. Hermione Granger," the bushy haired brunette that had been with Harry when Arielle tackle-hugged him introduced herself to Arielle, offering a hand to the younger girl.

"Oh," Arielle said, taking her hand, "I'm Arielle Potter."

"Ah, you're Harry's sister," Hermione said, releasing her grip on Arielle and turning to Ginny. "And you must be Ginny. Ron's sister? Well, it was nice to actually meet you both." She walked back to where Ron and Harry were talking with Mr. Weasley on their way up the stairs.

"Well that was interesting," Ginny commented, watching the girl who was friends with her brother jealously as she talked with Harry.

"Yeah, sure," Arielle said, finding it difficult to ignore her friend's envy. She didn't know whether to laugh at it or be annoyed with it. Ginny hadn't been herself since Harry arrived at the Burrow and it was starting to grate on Arielle's nerves. "Let's go, your mum is still worrying about Harry, we don't want to upset her by getting lost ourselves."

***

After everyone had gathered their money, everyone split up to do their own shopping, agreeing to meet at Flourish and Blotts in an hour. Percy mumbled something about quills and sped off. Harry, Ron, and Hermione walked off towards Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor while Fred and George headed over to Gambol and Japes where their friend was looking at the new Filibuster's fireworks. Mr. Weasley had just about dragged the Grangers over to the Leaky Cauldron.

"Alright girls, let's go get your robes. Of course, if you want robes from Madam Malkin's, Arielle, we can head there after Ginny's fitting—" Mrs. Weasley began.

"Mrs. Weasley, it would take so much less time if I just got my things by myself, if it's alright with you," Arielle said. "I promise I won't get lost. Plus it's safer here than in the city, and I've been by myself there loads of times."

Mrs. Weasley looked torn between keeping Arielle with her and finishing her errands on time. "I'm not happy about that either," she said. "But I suppose as long as you stay in the alley—" Arielle nodded emphatically "—and you make sure that you get everything you need…. Yes, alright, you can go, but I mean it, _no_ leaving Diagon Alley. No Knockturn Alley, no Muggle London, nothing."

"Yes, Mrs. Weasley," Arielle said, trying not to show the relief she felt at her freedom because Ginny was casting her pleading looks. She hated that she would get new supplies while Ginny was stuck with secondhand, but Mrs. Weasley would never consider borrowing from Harry and Arielle, despite the fact that they would willingly split their vault with the family. Shopping alone would allow Arielle a slightly more guilt-free experience.

"I expect you at Flourish and Blotts in an hour," said Mrs. Weasley as she turned and hauled Ginny off towards the secondhand robes shop.

Arielle went in the opposite direction down the street and into Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. In disconcerting contrast to the busy street outside, the shop was empty and quiet, save for the rather squat witch who was now striding towards Arielle, which had to be Madam Malkin herself.

"Hogwarts, dear?" Madam Malkin asked pleasantly. "We have everything here, come along now."

In the back, Arielle could see she truly was the only customer there. Although, if she'd had her way, she'd still be in bed, so the store's emptiness made almost perfect sense to her. After taking many more measurements than could possibly be necessary for the inner uniform, Madam Malkin slipped a large over-robe over Arielle's head and began pinning it to the right size. Arielle bit back a laugh as she watched how much of the fabric was being pinned: most of the fabric was going to be wasted because she was so tiny.

After the blouse, skirt, socks, and over-robe were bundled up, Arielle chose a pair of dragon hide gloves and a cloak, paid the witch and set off for Scribbulus Everchanging Inks two shops over. Many quills, rolls of parchment, and red inkwells later, she was on her way to Mulpepper's and the cauldron shop across from there.

Mulpepper's Apothecary smelled as one would expect a shop that sold raw potions ingredients to smell: awful and slightly nauseating. Its bad-eggs-and-cabbage smell seemed residual, as if even the strongest Scouring charm would never fully remove its presence, and the scent of an ingredient always preceded it being seen in the store. In spite of all this, Arielle seemed to be able to navigate the store with ease, finding both the highest quality crystal phials and the best starter's potions kit in record time.

Across the street, the cauldron shop was easier to take in. Standard pewter cauldrons stood front and center for the Hogwarts crowd. Unlike Madam Malkin's, this shop seemed to be at its breaking point with customers, probably because it was the closest to the Leaky Cauldron. Deciding to return to the cauldrons at the end, Arielle navigated the crowd and found one of the best set of scales on the market before asking one of the store's employees for her cauldron.

The next shop over, Astronomer's Alcove, was advertising a new line of telescopes. After splurging on her potion supplies, Arielle decided to just get a standard collapsible brass telescope for Astronomy. As she passed through the narrow aisles of the cramped store, she accidentally bumped into a blonde girl whose nose was buried in the latest edition of the Quibbler.

"Oh, sorry!" Arielle winced at her typical clumsy nature.

The girl seemed unfazed by the sudden collision. "That's quite alright," she said in a dreamy voice, looking at Arielle. She looked as if she was still daydreaming as she smiled benignly at her new companion. "It's been a while since I've seen anybody down here. I'm staring at Hogwarts this year, too, by the way."

"How did you—?"

"You've got all those supplies. I thought it was obvious. I'm Luna. Luna Lovegood," the girl explained.

"Nice to meet you, Luna. I'm Arielle Potter." Arielle was enjoying this strange new girl who was standing in an Astronomy store reading a magazine that was somewhat of a joke to the rest of the world. Her quirkiness was strangely refreshing.

"Nice to meet you, as well," Luna returned. "Well, I'll let you get back to shopping."

"Thanks, I guess I'll see you at school, then."

"Sure."

Arielle turned away and continued down the aisle, still not sure what to make of the encounter. She paid for her telescope and continued back towards Gringotts and Ollivander's. As she passed Eeylops Owl Emporium, she decided to look at the owls to see if she could get one. The Weasleys had Errol, but he was ancient and sometimes unreliable, Percy had Hermes, who he never lent to anyone, and Harry had Hedwig, but if this summer was any indication of how things were at the Dursleys', she wasn't available to send letters in the summer.

Eeylops had a wall of owl cages off to one side. Most of the customers were fawning over the gorgeous new screech and barn owls; Arielle, however, noticed a rather ragged-looking tawny in a cage in the corner. She looked around at the other customers, and none of them seemed to show any interest in this slightly neglected creature. The owl raised her head and hooted softly at Arielle.

The assistant manager was weaving through the crowd trying to sort out the problems the people were having over the sleek owls further down the wall. Spotting Arielle looking at the tawny owl, he detached himself from the other customers.

"Can I help you with anything?" he offered, looking between the redhead and the tawny hopefully.

"Um, yes, how much is she?" Arielle said, gesturing slightly towards the disheveled owl who was now trying to preen her feathers.

"Really? Ah, well, since she's been here so long," the assistant looked surprised that the tawny had gotten any attention, "how about six Galleons. She's and excellent hunter and reliable mail carrier, though I never thought she was going to sell…"

"Okay, six Galleons." Arielle paid for the owl and some owl treats and left the shop.

Her cauldron was getting to be very heavy with all of her school supplies in it, but she only had one more stop before she had to return to Flourish and Blotts. Arielle lugged her cauldron down the rest of the Alley to Ollivander's, waving at Harry and Ron as she passed.

Ollivander's was a narrow, empty shop that had thousands upon thousands of narrow boxes piled neatly to the ceiling. The atmosphere was silent, broken only by the sound of a tinkling bell in the distance. Arielle hardly dared to breathe, lest she break that silence, until a voice startled her from within the shop.

"Good morning," the old man standing before her said softly.

"Erm, hello," Arielle said, recovering from the jolt of surprise.

"Ah yes, I did wonder whether or not I _would_ be seeing you, considering they sent you away a few years ago," the man, probably Ollivander, said. "You look just like your mother, except the eyes. I remember when she was buying her first wand. Willow and unicorn hair, ten and a quarter inches, swishy. Excellent for charm work.

"Your father, however, was chosen by a mahogany wand. Eleven inches, nice wand for Transfiguration. Yes," he said, seeing that Arielle was about to ask something, "the wand chose him, as yours will choose you. The wand chooses the wizard, of course."

"You remember—?" Arielle began.

"Yes, I remember your parents' wands. I remember every wand I've ever sold. Now," Ollivander said, taking out a silvery tape measure, "which one is your wand arm?"

"Right," Arielle said.

"Hold your arm out. Just like that." He began taking all sorts of measurements, or rather, the tape measure did, as he no longer seemed to be holding it. With the air of someone who has repeated himself many times, he said, "Every Ollivander wand has a core of a powerful magical substance, Miss Potter. We use unicorn hairs, phoenix tail feathers, and the heartstrings of dragons. No two Ollivander wands are the same, just as no two unicorns, dragons, or phoenixes are the same. And of course, you will never get such good results with another witch or wizard's wand. That will do," he added, and the tape measure fell to the floor.

"Right then, try this one." Ollivander handed Arielle a wand. "Maple and phoenix feather. Seven inches. Quite whippy. No—" he said calmly before Arielle even really raised it. He snatched it back and handed her another before quickly snatching it away again. "Close, that time, but no."

Arielle must have tried twenty wands before, "Hazel and phoenix feather, eight and three-quarter inches, strong but flexible, try—"

This time, when she took the wand, it caused a tingling sensation in her fingers. She brought the wand down and a shower of gold sparks lit up the store, little sparks bouncing off the ceiling as if rejoicing. "Oh yes, bravo. Very good," Ollivander cheered.

Arielle smiled and paid seven Galleons for the new wand. Checking her watch, she saw that there were, surprisingly, still ten minutes left until she had to be at Flourish and Blotts. Deciding to wait at one of the tables outside Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor, Arielle set off in that direction.

This was the first experience since she began living with the Weasleys that she could relate to New York. She was alone in a crowded street with almost too many things to carry. The difference was that this time she felt safer and she was going to a place at the end of the day with a vastly more inviting quality to it where she felt welcome. Sitting at the shaded table, memories of the past few years surfaced: her Ministry-enforced separation from Bathilda, her two years of "foster care" in New York, the weeks she had to spend in St. Mungo's when the Ministry decided to bring her back…. Now all she wanted to know was why. Of course, she knew their "official" reasons, but she wanted the truth, the real reasons. She pulled out a length of parchment and began writing her thoughts. Thoughts became words, words became lines, and those lines became verses. It seemed second nature to her, and as she looked at the finished paper, she noticed a poem, an unfinished song of sorts, written before her as if it had been her intention to write it the whole time. It felt good to just get it down on paper, but it saddened her to know that she'd probably never get to try to put it to her music, as the Powells had destroyed all of the personal belongings that she'd had to leave behind in her escape, including her guitar.

Arielle checked the time and saw she had two minutes left. She quickly folded her lyrics and pocketed them, stowing her quill and ink back in their bag in her cauldron.

"Hey, little one!" shouted a familiar voice from down the street. Arielle looked up and saw the twins leaving their friend and making their way over to her, arms full of new joke products. She glared at the source of the voice.

"Hey, George, Fred," she said, turning from the speaker to his twin.

The latter grinned and said, "I'm not Fred, he is." Arielle rolled her eyes at him.

"I know your Fred just for saying that. You know I can tell you apart."

"Yes, really Fred, she's much too perceptive for us," George said, shaking his head. He frowned slightly as he took in Arielle's purchases. "Why'd you get an owl, Elle?"

Arielle sighed, "Because no one else was even paying attention to her, and Errol is almost useless and Percy won't let _anyone_ use Hermes."

Fred rolled his eyes and grinned. "You're just a sucker for charity. You saw a poor owl in a cage and you had to help her."

"Shut up, Fred."

"Hey, it's not a bad thing," George said defensively.

"Just a part of who you are," Fred said.

"And what makes you a better person than us," George finished jokingly.

"Flattery will get you nowhere," Arielle said lightheartedly. The trio made their way across the street to Flourish and Blotts, where Arielle grabbed the books on her supply list as they worked their way to where Mrs. Weasley was standing in line. Mentally sighing, Arielle resigned herself to a long wait in the cramped bookshop so her guardian could swoon over a man Arielle had no interest in seeing.

***

That night, Arielle was grooming her new tawny owl, whose feathers were still sticking out at odd angles. Since the assistant in Eeylops said she was a good hunter, Arielle had named her Artemis. It had been a long day and Arielle just wanted to go to sleep.

The signing at Flourish and Blotts had been a disaster, and Arielle had discovered that the Malfoys was just as bad as Harry, Ron, and Mr. Weasley made them out to be. She hoped she wouldn't have too many encounters with him once they got to school.

Arielle climbed into bed, giving up on grooming Artemis, and shut off the lamp by her bed. The tawny, following her mistress's lead, stopped preening and took off out the open window.

***

**Okay, I know the music thing probably seems stupid and chiched and everything, but it's a major part of the series. Not so much this story, but it picks up in the next one. Sorry, but I need it to turn Arielle into the character I need her to be.**

**Also, this story was originally published under "The Shadows Behind the Smile" instead of "Finding Her Place" because I had an idiot moment. Sorry.**

**I cut out the Lockhart scene because it's not important in Arielle's life, this chapter seemed to me like it was dragging and that would have added to it, and I'm not really supposed to be writing this because I still have projects to do, but my parents are out and I wanted to update 'cause I love you guys, even if there are only 16 of you so far! Yeah, I'm lazy, but only about schoolwork usually. It's been less than two weeks here, so I'm doing better with this than I am with my Spanish project :)**

**Love love love!**


	3. Chapter 2: Across The Lake

The first of September dawned early enough, if not particularly bright, on the Burrow as the mad rush to find all missing quills, books, and articles of clothing in between bites of breakfast ensued. The issue was no longer just getting the trunks to the car so much as packing the trunks themselves while dressing with one hand and cramming toast into waiting mouths with the other. People collided on the stairs, causing raucous screeching from the owls as their owners were nearly sent flying down the stairs. Amazingly, however, homework was found and packed, bodies were dressed, and stomachs were filled; not including Mr. Weasley's near-death experience with the chickens as he carried Ginny's trunk to the Ford Anglia, everyone left for the train station relatively unharmed with time to spare.

If only it had been that easy.

First, it had been George's Filibuster fireworks. Then, it was Fred's broomstick. After Ginny's diary, there was barely enough time to make it to King's Cross, and everyone was feeling the pressure.

They reached the station with fifteen minutes to spare. Mr. Weasley dashed over to get trolleys and, after loading the trunks on them, the Weasleys, Arielle, and Harry hurried to the barrier.

"Percy, first," Mrs. Weasley said, looking flustered and nervous as she glanced at the clock—only five minutes left now.

Percy did as he was told, followed by the twins. Mrs. Weasley took Ginny through, leaving her husband with Harry, Ron, and Arielle.

"I'll bring Elle through and you two should come through immediately," Mr. Weasley said, turning Arielle's trolley toward the barrier. She steeled herself, placing both hands firmly on the bar of the trolley, and when Mr. Weasley put one hand on the bar and began to push it toward the barrier, she followed him. She closed her eyes when the trunk hit the barrier, all traces of the morning's rush fading as time seemed to slow for those last few running steps.

Upon opening her eyes, she was bombarded by sights and sounds she couldn't have imagined in her wildest dreams. The scarlet steam engine, the people, and sign declaring "Platform 9 ¾" above her head were almost overwhelming. Arielle's mind reeled as she took it all in, but everything crashed back to earth when she heard a voice not three feet from her.

"Arielle, come on, we've got to go!" shouted Ginny. "Let's go try and find a compartment, because if we don't, we're stuck with Fred and George."

First day at Hogwarts. Train leaves in one minute. Right.

"You're right, let's move," Arielle replied, following her friend towards the train.

That last minute was a blur. Both girls miraculously got their trunks on the train and into an overhead compartment along with Artemis' cage, and—even more surprisingly—they found an empty compartment. The Hogwarts Express had started pulling slowly out of the station when Ginny opened the window so she and Arielle could shout their goodbyes.

And then they were gone.

Arielle and Ginny sat alone in the compartment making rather pathetic attempts at conversation for nearly half an hour before a bushy-haired girl burst their awkward bubble by opening the compartment door. Hermione Granger stood in the doorway panting slightly, appraising the two redheads in much the same way they were studying her.

"Have either of you seen Ron or Harry?" she asked nervously. "I've been waiting for them and I finally searched most of the train, but I can't find them anywhere."

Ginny frowned slightly. "I haven't seen either of them since I went through the barrier, but everything was so rushed, I probably missed them." Her casual words were betrayed by the worry in her voice.

"You said you searched _most_ of the train?" Arielle said, hoping against hope that meant their compartment wasn't the final stop on the search.

"Well, everywhere except the Slytherin compartments," said Hermione, and Arielle's heart sank, "but I can't think of a reason for the boys to be there."

"You're right, there isn't one," admitted Ginny dejectedly.

"You want us to help you look?" Arielle offered, not knowing what else to do despite the feeling that she already knew the answer.

Hermione sighed, "No, I've tried everywhere I can think of. If they're here, they'll find us."

"Maybe they didn't get through the barrier on time," Ginny supplied, more out of a need to get rid of the worry than of any real belief.

"Mmhmm…" agreed Arielle absentmindedly. "Do you want to sit with us, then?" she added to Hermione, who hadn't completely entered the compartment yet. The older girl bit her lip before nodding and entering the compartment, closing the door and sitting awkwardly on the seat next to it.

What had to be the single most quiet and tense hour followed Hermione's entrance, the only sounds coming from Ginny's quill scratching away on the pages of her diary and Hermione's deep breaths before each unsuccessful attempt to break the vocal silence. Arielle chewed her lower lip absentmindedly as she forced the darker images of what could have happened to her brothers into the furthest recesses of her mind. What if they'd been seen? What if they'd been attacked by a Muggle thug? Worse, what if they'd been properly cursed? _What if…?_

Her frightening musings, as well as the less-than-comfortable silence, were interrupted by the compartment door sliding open to reveal three boys about Hermione's age leaning menacingly in the doorway, the green lining on their robes indicating their place in Slytherin house. Arielle recognised the smirking boy in the middle as Draco Malfoy, the boy from Flourish and Blotts, and put that together with what she'd heard from Ron and Harry to place the two thuggish creatures flanking him as Crabbe and Goyle. Malfoy's smirk deepened as his gaze fell first on Ginny and then Hermione before turning to Arielle.

"I never thought I'd see a family that would actually _try _at being poor, but then life's full of surprises, isn't it," he sneered. "My father told me about you, the orphan that the foolish Weasleys took in," he added, sensing the reaction he wanted rising to the surface. "Tragic, really. Without a home, without parents; unwanted, unloved, bounced from house to house waiting for somewhere where you belonged. Then the Weasleys got stuck with you and they don't even have the gold to pull themselves through, let alone someone with nothing of their own—"

"Are you really so pathetic that you've shrunk down to bullying the first years about their lives?" Hermione interjected, but he'd hit a nerve already. Ginny had turned scarlet at the mention of her family's finances, and Arielle had had to grip the seat to avoid jumping up at the word "unloved" and beating the sneering blond head into a pulp.

"I didn't ask your opinion, Granger, and I wasn't finished. I'm merely reminding her of what she has to gain from choosing the option her brother chose to ignore," Malfoy said, glaring at Hermione a moment longer before turning back to Arielle. "As you can see, that choice didn't work out so well for him. Word on the train is Boy Wonder and his pet Weasel have missed the train."

"Do you have a point, Malfoy, or are you just ranting?" Arielle asked, trying not to show how shaken she felt.

Malfoy quirked an eyebrow quickly before returning his face to its basic smirk. "I don't know your name, but you're Potter's sister, and with the proper help, you could actually achieve great things. You may not get this, but you'll find out some wizarding families are better than others." He looked pointedly at Ginny before gesturing at his personal guard. "This is Crabbe and Goyle, and we can help you make the right sort of friends. You don't want to be seen with blood traitors and Mudbloods—"

Arielle had gotten out of her seat at "right sort," but the heel of her right hand didn't connect with Malfoy's cheekbone until after he had gotten the word "Mudblood" out. He staggered backwards holding his face, and she knew with some feeling of triumph that his left eye would swell at least partially shut.

"I'd rather be around them than the likes of you," she said, but most of her confidence dissipated as Crabbe and Goyle started forward into the compartment. She had been hoping that they were mostly for show, seeing as they didn't seem able to speak, but she was about to be let down.

There was a bang like a gunshot and a bright flash of light. Both hulking youths were knocked off their feet and out of the compartment by twin beams of silvery light. Their ringleader ran after them, still clutching his rapidly swelling face. The compartment door now framed two very familiar, _very_ welcome faces, as well as a third, darker face that threatened more damage to the Slytherins if they retaliated rather than any to the girls inside the compartment.

"And stay away from our little sisters!" George shouted down the train as the three boys entered the compartment, slamming the door behind them.

"What happened?" Fred asked, looking at Arielle, who was still standing in the middle of the compartment.

"Malfoy came in here to bully her into joining the 'dark side,'" Ginny said, understating it to the point of ridiculousness in Arielle's opinion. Fred and George scowled at this statement, so she decided maybe understatement was the way to go.

"Then he insulted Ginny and Hermione, so I sort of hit him," Arielle said. Rather than showing more anger, the three boys started laughing.

"'Sort of hit him'?" the twins' friend repeated. "He's not going to be able to see out of that eye for at least a week."

"You should have seen his face when he got knocked out of the compartment," George said.

"He's never been so shocked in his life, I'll bet," Fred said.

Unlike the boys, Hermione didn't seem to find the situation funny. "Why do you think he came here? I mean, sure, turning her against Harry may be good for the Slytherins, but what information did he have that made coming down here worth his while?"

"The information that I'm an orphan whose brother didn't make the train. Fresh meat, you know," Arielle offered.

"I don't think that's it. Like he said, he doesn't know your name, and he hardly seemed bothered by that, but what if…" Comprehension dawned over Hermione's face. "What if he knows why Harry and Ron missed the train?"

"I doubt it," Ginny said. "From what I've heard from Ron—and keep in mind this is _Ron_ I'm talking about, not the most reliable source—he'd never pass up an opportunity to gloat about something that big."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, _hold it_," Fred said.

"Ickle Ronniekins and Harry aren't on the train?" George asked.

"And you didn't come _find_ us?" Fred asked, feigning insult.

"If you'll recall," Hermione said, bristling, "I _did_ come and find you when I was looking for them and asked if you'd seen them, but _you_—" she glared at Fred "—said something wildly obscene in front of a large group of people about where Ron might be, so I just left you all to it."

"Wildly obscene? _Me?_" Fred said, gesturing at himself.

"We're never _wildly _obscene," George stated.

"Yeah, they've generally agreed to keep it from mild to moderate obscenity," their friend added.

"Which is _not _the point," Ginny reminded them. "The point is Malfoy knows something."

"Or _thinks_ he knows something," Arielle said. "Whatever it is, we're not likely to find out until we make it to the castle, so there's no use worrying."

George sighed, "She's right. I hate it when she's right."

"Yeah," agreed Fred, "but we should at least stay here to make sure those three—" he hesitated before deciding to fix his word choice "—don't decide to come back."

Without waiting for a reply, the three boys made themselves comfortable in empty seats in the compartment, the twins seated near Hermione and their friend between Ginny and Arielle.

"Anyway Lee, what were you saying about 'the Sight' before we were so rudely interrupted?" George asked conversationally.

"Hmm?" Lee asked, startled by the abrupt topic change. "Oh, right. Well, I figure that most of whatever Trelawney does is just observation, you know. Noticing how people react to certain things and playing off of that. It's obvious her work is a sham, but she's still able to pass for a Seer enough to get a job at Hogwarts, so I figure if I start paying attention to things, I can call myself a Seer, too."

"Yeah, but Trelawney's got Seer blood, so she's got that working for her," Fred said. "You, on the other hand, can't even manage to guess when we will have a surprise quiz in Potions."

"And his hints are none too subtle," George added.

"Okay, that's hardly fair; he grades things that shouldn't even count," Lee argued. "You're missing the point. All Divination is, is observation and guesswork."

"I agree, but, again, I'm not seeing how this relates to you," George said.

Lee let out a disgruntled breath, pushing his shoulder-length dreadlocks out of his face. "I'm _saying_, I can pretend to be a Seer to mess with people." He turned to Arielle. "I bet I can guess your name."

Fred and George groaned. "He's been doing this for months," George said to Arielle.

"You _know_ her name, dimwit," Fred told Lee.

"I'm bad with names," Lee argued feebly.

Arielle quirked an eyebrow at the twins' friend. "You think you can guess my name? Go for it."

Lee smiled at her before staring at her intensely. Arielle couldn't break eye contact, though she wanted to, fearing it might mess up whatever process he had come up with. He was obviously concentrating, frowning slightly as he stared. Now that she thought about it, she recognised him from Diagon Alley and wondered why it took her so long to put it together.

After what was treated like the world's most interesting staring match, Lee said uncertainly, "Lexxie?"

Arielle shook her head, surprisingly disappointed that he had been wrong when she hadn't thought he'd be able to do it in the first place, but Fred and George exploded with catcalls.

"You guys are obnoxious," Hermione said simply. The twins ignored her.

"That's _Arielle_, twit," George stated.

"Oh," Lee said quietly, then with more confidence, "I've never met her, how was I supposed to remember?" He looked back at Arielle. "Can I call you Lexxie? Otherwise, I'll just start making up names for you until I can remember Arielle."

She laughed, "Sure, it's better than half of what _they_ call me." Arielle looked pointedly at Fred and George.

"Aw come on," Fred said.

"You just _love_ being called Shortykins and Carrot Top," George said.

Arielle rolled her eyes. "See what I mean? You all are delusional."

"We don't call you half-pint," Fred offered.

"Only 'cause Charlie claimed that one," George reminded him.

They continued for a while arguing over stupid nicknames before dropping the subject and talking about whatever came to mind, though Hermione would shut off at the mention of any pranks from the boys. The lunch trolley came and went, and soon the compartment was full of empty sweet wrappers and happy wizarding students. Eventually, the older boys decided that the girls were not going to be attacked by any more Slytherins and left as the sky started to turn magnificent shades of orange with the sunset.

Without the brighter attitudes of the fourth year Gryffindors, the girls' worries about Harry and Ron returned. They tried to hide it, Ginny pulling out her diary and Arielle putting in her earphones to listen to her cantaviSnidget*, but it was Hermione who cracked first.

"Maybe I just _missed _them," she said to herself, as if the words were just a continuation of her thoughts. "They could have been in the loo." She didn't notice that Arielle and Ginny had turned to stare at her. She seemed to have made up her mind about something, however, and stood up. "I'm going to go find Neville. Maybe he's seen Ron and Harry and didn't think anything of it."

"Hermione…" Ginny began.

Hermione sighed. "I know, but I have to try. You two should change, we're almost at Hogsmeade station; I'll be back soon." She left the compartment and closed the door behind her.

Arielle and Ginny shared a brief look of sympathy before pulling the curtain over the door window and extracting their robes from their trunks. The uniforms left them clearly marked as first years, for their House's—_or,_ Arielle thought,_ Houses'_—color—_colors?_—wasn't lining the robes, the crest—_crests?_— wasn't stitched in, and they didn't have House ties. Arielle looked at Ginny's basically blank school robes and started to worry for the first time. They could be in separate Houses, and if that happened, they may not have any classes at all together, may never see each other except over break. She did not want that to happen, and she could tell Ginny's thoughts mirrored hers.

"You scared?" Ginny asked as she packed her normal clothes away.

"No," Arielle answered, and she honestly wasn't. She had been through too much "new" for this to scare her.

"Nervous?"

"Nah," she replied, but this time it was a downright lie. "You?"

"Hardly," Ginny scoffed, her heart not really in it. Each one knew the other was lying, but it was alright. They knew each other well enough to know that pressing the matter would not help anything, so they let it go.

The train had started to slow, and a voice echoed through the train, "We will be reaching Hogwarts in three minutes' time. Please leave your luggage on the train, it will be taken to the school separately. Also, please excuse the short notice; there was a situation that had to be dealt with."

Arielle bit her lip and looked at Ginny, whose freckles had even paled with nerves. Hermione ran into the compartment fully-robed, leaving the door open. She didn't need to speak to tell them the outcome of her search, although Arielle could guess what the "situation" the conductor had been talking about. She tucked the cantaviSnidget into her pocket and went into the corridor.

The train stopped at a dark platform. The girls joined the flock of students exiting the train. "I won't be able to stay with you," Hermione said. "You'll be crossing the lake. Don't worry, Hagrid will be going with you. Good luck!"

Hermione hurried over to the horseless carriages, her last words ringing in Arielle's head. What could they possibly need luck for? Maybe it really _was_ some horribly tricky task they had to complete. _What if_…

_Stop it_, she told herself, _you're just freaking yourself out_.

There was a lamp bobbing high over the heads of the first years. "Firs' years! Firs' years over here!" called a wonderfully familiar voice, even if Arielle barely knew the speaker. Arielle grabbed Ginny's elbow and led her over to where Hagrid was standing to the side amidst a group of first years. There were barely over a score of students gathered around the gargantuan man. Arielle recognised a blond girl who seemed transparent enough to be a ghost as Luna Lovegood, the girl she met in the astronomy shop.

"Any more firs' years? Firs' years follow me! Mind your step, now!"

Hagrid led them down a steep, narrow path, the eleven-year-olds slipping in the darkness. Nobody spoke.

"Yeh'll get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec," Hagrid called to the small group. "It's jus' round the bend."

The pathway opened up to what seemed to be a docking station for a small fleet of boats. Perched high on a mountain was the castle, its windows shining like the stars in the sky behind it.

"Whoa," Arielle breathed, and she heard the comment echoed twice, once by Ginny and once by a tall, dark-haired girl who stood behind her.

"No more'n four to a boat!" Hagrid announced, pointing at the cluster of boats tied up by the shore. Arielle and Ginny were followed into their boat by the dark-haired girl and Luna Lovegood.

"Everyone in?" Hagrid called from his own personal boat. "Right then—_forward!_"

The little fleet all started as one, gliding across the still-smooth lake. Everyone stared silently at the castle looming overhead. At Hagrid's warning, they ducked their heads under the hanging ivy and continued along an underground tunnel until they reached the harbor, where the first years clambered back onto solid ground. From there, they followed the light from Hagrid's lamp up a passageway and onto the flat grass in front of the castle. The little group walked a flight of stone stairs before stopping at a great oak front door.

"Everyone here?" Hagrid called, before raising his fist and knocking on the front door solidly three times.

***

***The cantaviSnidget is a non-Canon, bordering on AU, wizarding mP3 comparable to the present day iPod. Anyone who owns an iPod nanochromatic (or, technically, an iPod gen. 4) knows the basic size and shape of the cantaviSnidget (or Snidget, iSnidget, cantaviS, etc. I haven't decided on a shorter name for it). It comes from the Latin word "cantavi" ("to sing or play"), and a Snidget is a small, golden bird (for full details, buy "Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them"). The company is CantaviUniversal, which owns the now-struggling WWN station W.A.N.D. Radio. That's important later, but I won't go into it now.**

**Yay, chapter 2 is finally done. I actually have it saved at "1st September," but I cut it in two so I could get this out, because I've been working on it for 5 days (which is still more than I put into my homework XD) and I've basically hit a wall. Can you tell? I'm sorry. Still hasn't been too long since I've updated, and I'll try again soon.**

**And anyone who was worried about how I'd do with my Spanish summer assignment, I read it the weekend after school started (aka the LAST minute) and was the only one out of the two Honors classes to get 100% on it. Who says procrastination doesn't pay off?**


	4. Chapter 3: The Sorting

It was as if she knew exactly when Hagrid would knock, because the door swung open immediately to reveal the tall, black-haired woman who stood there. Her face was stern, but it did not threaten meanness. All the same, she did not seem to be the kind of person to be trifled with.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," Hagrid said by way of mass introduction.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here."

She pulled the door further open to allow the first years admittance to the castle. _This hall is big enough to fit Bathilda's house_, Arielle thought before mentally scolding herself. She must not think about it; it would only make things worse. She knew she couldn't see Bathilda until she was of age and the Ministry couldn't interfere again, yet she subconsciously tortured herself with similar thoughts regularly. Bracing herself, Arielle forced herself to let go of the subject again.

Arielle took note of the torches lighting the stone walls, the high ceiling, and the marble staircase as she followed Professor McGonagall across the flagstones. Arielle could hear voices coming from the room behind a closed door to the right, but the first years were led to an empty chamber adjacent to the entrance hall. The little group nervously clustered together much closer than they might have done elsewhere.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," Professor McGonagall began with the air of someone who had said very much the same words year after year for some time. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you may take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while at Hogwarts, your house will be something like your family within the castle. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room.

"The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards." Arielle thought sceptically of Slytherin and doubted the "noble history" bit, but she continued to listen. "While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points; any rule breaking will lose your house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great honour. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school." This seemed to Arielle like a statement _meant_ to make the students worry. "I suggest you smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting."

The professor's eyes landed on Luna's strange, radish-like earrings. Arielle self-consciously checked to make sure her hair had stayed dark red throughout her stress-filled journey.

"I shall return when we are ready for you. Please wait quietly," Professor McGonagall said. She left and Arielle turned to Ginny, who had gone sickly pale.

"What's going to happen?" Arielle murmured. She'd heard Fred's stories last year, but she also knew enough about him to know that his stories, when told for Ron's benefit, were to be taken with an ocean of salt.

Ginny shrugged. "No one tells me anything." Arielle knew the feeling all too well.

The students were standing in awkward near-silence when Professor McGonagall returned. "Form a line and follow me," she said sharply to the first years. "The Sorting Ceremony is about to begin."

Arielle got in line with Ginny behind her and followed a girl with caramel-coloured hair out of the chamber, back down the hall, and through a pair of double doors into the Great Hall.

The Hall was beyond magnificent, lit with thousands of candles floating over the four house tables set with golden plates and goblets. On the opposite side of the Hall from the doors was a fifth table set for the teachers. Interspersed among the hundreds of students filling the tables were silvery ghosts whom appeared misty in the candlelight. Arielle looked up and saw the bewitched ceiling showing the image of the cloudy sky above; it seemed as if the ceiling was altogether forgotten.

Looking towards the teachers' table once more, Arielle noticed that Professor McGonagall had placed a stool in front of the line of first years. Set on the stool was a very worn, very old wizard's hat. The Great Hall grew silent and stayed that way for a few seconds. Then the hat twitched, a rip near the brim opened like a mouth, and it began to sing.

Arielle, in her already nervous state, was too shocked by this to register much of what was sung, only catching certain verses such as "_If you are brave and daring,/ Then Gryffindor might suit you,/ Where courage is expected/ And chivalry is a virtue_" and lines extolling the minds of Ravenclaws, the loyalty and justice of Hufflepuffs, and the cunning and ambition of Slytherins. The applause at the end of the Sorting Hat's song was what brought Arielle back to the present—and Ginny's outraged whispers about Fred being a dirty rotten liar, which were expected.

Professor McGonagall stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment. "When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she informed the first years. "Anderson, Kevin!"

A boy with dirty-blond hair hurried forward and placed the hat on his head. The silence seemed to last forever before—

"HUFFLEPUFF!" the hat announced.

The table on the far right exploded with cheers as Kevin removed the hat and joined its ranks.

"Applegate, John!"

There was a much shorter pause before the hate once again decided "HUFFLEPUFF!" John quickly joined Kevin at the Hufflepuff table.

"Brocklehurst, Evan!"

The dark-haired boy had the hat on for two seconds before being made the first Ravenclaw. The table directly to Arielle's left cheered this time as Evan took a seat by a girl who could have been related to him.

Arielle risked a glance over at the Gryffindor table, immediately spotting Fred and George due to their vivid hair—and being slightly disappointed when they are paying attention to the Sorting Hat and not goofing off.

"Chaisely, Anita" became the first Slytherin and joined the table directly to Arielle's right. Her stomach was tying itself in knots now. She was getting annoyed with herself—it wasn't like her to get this nervous.

"Creevey, Colin!"

A boy similar in size to Arielle—this being extremely small— with mousy-brown hair scampered up to the stool and placed the hat on his head. He was so small the hat nearly engulfed his head, barely being stopped by his ears. The hat took at least a minute to pick his brain before calling "GRYFFINDOR!" "Donohue, Scarlett," the other girl who shared the boat with Ginny, Luna, and Arielle, joined Colin thirty seconds later at the Gryffindor table.

"Fey, Reese!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Flint, Elisabeth!"

"SLYTHERIN!"

"Goldstein, Chelsea!"

"RAVENCLAW!"

"Kirke, Andrew!"

"GRYFFINDOR!"

"Knighton, Kira!"

"GRYFFINDOR!"

"Lovegood, Luna!"

"RAVENCLAW!"

"McLaughlin, Gina!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Meade, Sara!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Parkinson, Carmela!"

"RAVENCLAW!"

"Parkinson, Victor!"

"SLYTHERIN!"

"Potter, Arielle!"

The world stopped. Her heart stopped. She could hardly remember if she was breathing. Then, suddenly, murmurs broke out across the hall. Arielle made her way to the front of the hall hearing whispers of "_Potter_? There's more than one?" Miraculously, Arielle made it to the front of the hall and placed the hat on her head. It slid down past her chin, blocking her view of the shocked faces and, thankfully, the shocked chatter.

The hat had a musty smell that, while not unbearable, made Arielle's head feel fuzzy, alleviating some of the nerves. "Hmm," the hat murmured in her ear. "So much talent, yes, but not nearly enough ambition. You're intelligent, of course, but the loyalty here is astonishing."

Arielle could see where this was going. The hat was right, she did not have the ambition—or the cutthroat attitude—required to be a Slytherin. She was smart and loyal, of course, but she needed the hat to see more...

"Ah, that's interesting—all of that loyalty is part of something else. You have nerve, a willingness to go unthinkingly to save others—anyone...and the courage to follow through. Well then, you belong in GRYFFINDOR!" The last word was shouted to the entire Great Hall. If the hat hadn't been blocking Arielle's view completely, she might have run towards the table with it still on her head, she was so relieved. As it was, she quickly pulled the Sorting Hat off before speeding towards Fred and George at the Gryffindor table. She barely noticed that the cheers seemed confused and half-hearted, the true cheers coming from Percy, Fred, George, the twins' friend, Lee, Hermione, and the two other first years, Scarlett and Colin—the only people who either knew her or didn't really know much about the school.

The Sorting had continued; "Saunders, Jacob" has been made a Hufflepuff and "Scamander, Rolf" was now on the stool.

"RAVENCLAW!" the hat announced

"Sloper, Jack!"

"GRYFFINDOR!"

"Smith, Zacharias!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Weasley, Ginevra!"

Arielle watched as Ginny's entire face—freckles included—paled. She hurried up to the stool and vanished inside the hat. She was up there for ages before the hat decided "GRYFFINDOR!" and Ginny joined Arielle at the table, still too pale.

Two people were left now—"Wood-Greene, Miranda" and "Zhang, Christian" were both sorted into Hufflepuff. Everyone's attention turned to the professors' table.

"Looks like Snape's gone missing," George observed.

"Good riddance to him, then!" Fred declared. Arielle looked down the table and noticed an empty chair next to Professor McGonagall's.

Headmaster Albus Dumbledore got to his feet and surveyed the hall as everyone grew quiet. "To our new students, welcome to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry! To our older students, welcome back!" Professor Dumbledore began. "I believe I've said it before, but I've found that it never hurts to remind others of certain matters, so I hope most of you will forgive me for saying it again: There is a time for speech-making, but now, while you're all hungry, is not it. Enjoy!" He sat back down.

Arielle frowned slightly and looked down at the table, her eyes widening in shock at what she saw. The empty platters and pitchers were now full of possibly the most delicious food she had ever seen: roasted meats, pork chops, boiled potatoes, roast potatoes, bread rolls, various pasta dishes, steamed vegetables, carrot sticks, celery sticks, fruit, seafood, and so much more. Arielle filled her plate with pasta, bread, boiled potatoes, and even a few carrot sticks before beginning to eat. She hadn't realized how hungry she was, but after a few bites the old worries about Harry and Ron hit her again and she slowed down, looking out the window in a futile attempt to get some hint of their presence. Focusing on the window, Arielle didn't hear George's efforts to distract her at first.

"Arielle!" he roared at her, finally snapping her out of her self-induced trance. She gave him a shocked look before quirking an eyebrow questioningly. He just laughed. "What's up with your food?"

That was not what she expected to hear. "What are you talking about?"

"Well, barring the fact that usually you can—"

"—and will—" Fred added.

"—eat so much more than that, what's up with the carrot sticks?"

"I like carrots," Arielle said, rolling her eyes despite her thankfulness for the distraction. They'd been over this hundreds of times before; the familiarity kept her mind from the _what ifs_ that kept popping up.

"But they're so _healthy_," Fred said childishly, wrinkling his nose in the process before stuffing more roast chicken into his mouth.

Arielle lowered one eyebrow disapprovingly at her adoptive brother's eating habits. "Yeah, and cramming your mouth to bursting is _not_."

"Ah leas' we're ea'in' 'ea' 'ood," George forced out of his full mouth. It was Arielle's turn to make a face.

She speared a chunk of boiled potato on her fork and said, "This _is_ real food, and I'm not likely to choke on it. And how gross is it that I can understand you when you talk like that?"

Just then, the doors to the Great Hall swung open to admit a man with long curtains of greasy black hair and a hooked nose. He strode up to the High Table to speak with Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall. The hall grew quiet as everyone tried to hear the topic of conversation, but after a few moments' hushed talking, the three teachers left the hall.

"So Snape decided to show his unwashed face this year after all," Lee said as the conversation crescendo-ed to a higher decibel than before.

"And here I was hoping that good ol' Dumbledore had finally seen the light and decided to let him go," George said reminiscently.

Unfortunately, Snape's arrival had caused an outbreak of rumours—all of which involved Harry and Ron and why they weren't on the train. Expulsion was a popular one, which Arielle could dismiss easily, but the rumour of kidnapping chilled her to the bone (possibly because she heard it right when Nearly Headless Nick shook her hand, though she doubted it). There were less dramatic answers as well, but the popular rumours were harsh and, on most occasions, fantastical.

It wasn't until the three teachers returned and the remains of the desserts began to disappear that a sandy-haired boy came down the table to ask Hermione if it was true that Harry and Ron had been expelled for flying a car to school. Of course, Hermione told him rather harshly that she had no idea what had happened to the boys, that she highly doubted even _they_ would be stupid enough to do such a thing, and that people needed to stop spreading rumours before it came back to bite them before asking Percy the password and marching out of the hall, leaving the boy sitting there shocked and more than a little scared. Arielle, however, turned wide-eyed to Ginny and mouthed, _They didn't!_ Ginny returned the wide-eyed stare and shook her head, shrugging. Arielle looked to her left where Fred had been forced to abandon his disappearing pie. The look on his face said that he had heard, too, and rather than being worried, he was envious of his little brother's experience.

Professor Dumbledore's speech was short, though Arielle couldn't concentrate on it. Harry and Ron had _flown to school_. They may have gotten expelled for it. What had _happened_? She was still staring blankly at the High Table when Ginny tugged on her arm to make her stand up. She blinked confusedly at her friend for a moment before returning to the present and following Percy out of the hall.

The Gryffindors reached the Grand Staircase and broke away from the rest of the school, following the Prefects up fourteen flights of stairs to the seventh floor, down a corridor, behind a tapestry, down another corridor, through a sliding wall, and finally behind another tapestry before stopping in front of a painting of a rather large woman in a pink silk dress. The colour made Arielle cringe internally.

"Password?" she asked.

"Wattlebird," Percy said, and the portrait swung open to reveal a large round hole in the wall. Everyone scrambled through quickly and found themselves in the squashy-armchair-filled Gryffindor common room. The cosiness of the room alleviated the tension Arielle was feeling by a small bit, and she went to sit on the floor by the fireplace as Percy rattled off the location of the girls' dormitories—up the staircase on the right—and the boys dormitories—the same on the right. Arielle was exhausted, but she knew she wouldn't be able to sleep until she knew exactly what happened to Ron and Harry.

Her fellow Gryffindors seemed to be feeling the same way, although for much different reasons. While Arielle was worried about her brothers' well-being, the others were more concerned about whether or not the boys were this week's heroes or topic of shame. Arielle just leaned against an armchair and hugged her knees to her chest, staring at the flames and thinking.

Her vision had blurred from lack of blinking when the common room exploded into a chorus of cheers. She jumped up and turned, looking for the cause—and sure enough, there was Ron's vivid red hair visible above the other heads followed by Harry's black hair and bespectacled face. Both had been dragged into the common room by numerous new admirers.

"Brilliant!" Lee Jordan declared. "Inspired! What an entrance! Flying a car right into the Whomping Willow, people'll be talking about that one for years—"

"Good for you," someone said; another was patting Harry on the back; a third was shaking Ron's hand. "Why couldn't we've come in the car, eh?" the twins chorused.

Ron turned bright red and grinned shyly, but Harry seemed to have noticed that not everyone was impressed by their antics. First, he saw Arielle, who mouthed, _Git!_ at him, and then Percy, who was trying to fight through the sea of younger students to tell Harry and Ron off. Harry nudged Ron and indicated to Percy; Ron, surprisingly, got the point immediately.

"Got to get upstairs—bit tired," Ron said, and the two headed for the dormitories. Harry looked at Arielle and mouthed, _Sorry_, before disappearing up the stairs. The rest of the students seemed to realize how tired they were as well, for the common room began to clear out. Arielle headed up the staircase and found the dorm marked **FIRST YEARS** to be the second door from the bottom. She entered to find one of the girls, Kira, already there. She had long, straight dark blonde hair and was a few inches taller than Arielle and Ginny, who had followed Arielle up the stairs.

"Hi, I'm Kira. Kira Knighton," she said, smiling slightly at the two redheads. They were about to introduce themselves when the fourth member of their dormitory entered.

"Sorry," she said, shaking back here dark brown curls. "Does that always happen? The car thing, I mean." Seeing the negative head shake, she continued, "I'm Scarlett Donohue, but nearly everyone calls me Star. You can, if you want."

"Nice to meet you," Arielle said. "I'm Arielle Potter, and people call me pretty much whatever they want because they like giving me nicknames. I don't get it." She shrugged nonchalantly.

"And I'm Ginny Weasley," Ginny said. "My full name's _Ginevra_, but the only person—and I mean _only person_—who calls me that is my great-Aunt Muriel, so please don't start." They all laughed at that before heading to their respective four-poster beds, changing into pyjamas, and falling asleep.

*******

**A/N: Yes, my poetry is awful. Yes, I realize I shouldn't write a first year fic (but I feel like I need to for all of anything to make sense). Yes, I'm blowing off homework to do this, and you know you love me for it.**

**I didn't write a Sorting Hat song because...well, you saw my poetry. And I didn't write a Dumbledore speech because a lot of this is what ARIELLE remembers, not what the author knows (which is about nothing until her 3rd year, actually =) )**

**Arielle eats like a pig, just not when she's worried. Legitimately the world's fastest metabolism. And the thing the Sorting Hat said about not enough ambition to be a Slytherin is important. I wasted a lot of space on listing the first years, but there are only twenty-four of them and I took the time to list, aphabetize (with one little mistake), and Sort all of them, so I put them in here. Yes, Carmela and Victor are Pansy's sibilings, fraternal twins, and the fact that Carmela is Ravenclaw is important to the story later, but will NOT get her disowned, or even a Howler.**

**Longest chapter ever! 3,222 words! Keep me motivated, although this week doesn't work with my full tech rehersals. _Talk Radio_ baby!**

**Love you!**


	5. Chapter 4: Not Fitting In

The next morning, it took Arielle and Ginny the better part of an hour to find the Great Hall for breakfast, and they only found it then because Nearly Headless Nick, the Gryffindor house ghost, showed them the way. Whispers were following Arielle everywhere from people wondering why no one knew about her and if she was even related to Harry at all. She just ignored them, but inside they were bothering her a great deal.

Tired and a little nervous, Arielle sat down by Harry, Ron, and Hermione, facing the rest of the hall. Ginny turned scarlet when she saw Harry but sat down on Arielle's other side. At the Slytherin table, Arielle noticed that Malfoy was sporting a brilliant purple and black left eye and was having trouble seeing through the swelling. She felt less tense as she smirked slightly and started gathering breakfast on to her plate.

Hermione was obviously still miffed at the boys for arriving so recklessly the night before; she had _Voyages with Vampires_ propped against the milk jug and was pointedly ignoring both of them. A round-faced boy with brown hair, on the other hand, was talking cheerily with Harry and Ron.

"Mail's due any minute," he said. "I think Gran's sending a few things I forgot."

Sure enough, there was a rush of wings a few moments later as hundreds of owls flooded the ceiling of the Great Hall and searched for their owners, dropping letters and parcels into their laps. After living with—several—wizarding families in the past, Arielle was used to similar mail deliveries, but she could hear the shocked gasps of other students who weren't ready for it. The boy sitting by Harry had a lumpy package bounce off his head, and then something gray and feathery fell into the jug Hermione was using as a book stand.

"_Errol!_" Ron said, pulling the sopping wet owl out by his feet. Errol fell unconscious onto the table, damp red envelope still clamped in his beak. Arielle drew in a sharp breath, recognising it immediately.

"Oh, no—" Ron hissed, eyes widening.

"It's alright, he's still alive," Hermione said, prodding Errol gently and surprisingly not understanding Ron's worry.

"It's not that—it's _that_." Ron pointed at the envelope. The other boy looked terrified of the letter, and Arielle turned to look at Ginny's response. The scarlet-haired girl looked like she expected the envelope to explode. Arielle knew what the letter was—and wasn't entirely sure Ron didn't deserve it—but she didn't know what would happen if he just ignored it.

Harry obviously had no idea what was going on. "What's the matter?" he asked.

"She's—she's sent me a Howler," Ron said squeakily.

"You'd better open it, Ron. It'll be worse if you don't," the round-faced boy whispered. "My gran sent me one once, and I ignored it and—it was horrible."

"What's a Howler?" Harry asked, looking between the boys' terrified faces and then at the red letter, still not getting it.

"You'll see," Arielle said, watching as the envelope began to smoke at the corners.

"Open it. It'll all be over in a few minutes—" the boy said.

Ron reached out and shakily took the letter from Errol's beak. As he opened it, Arielle covered her ears just as the roar from within the scarlet envelope shook the entire hall.

"—_**STEALING THE CAR, I WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN SURPRISED IF THEY'D EXPELLED YOU, YOU WAIT TILL I GET A HOLD OF YOU, I DON'T SUPPOSE YOU STOPPED THE THINK WHAT YOU FATHER AND I WENT THROUGH WHEN WE SAW IT WAS GONE—**_"

Mrs. Weasley's amplified shouts shook the tables, proving that she could always shout louder than people thought possible. Ron turned crimson and sunk down in his chair so only the top of his head was visible as people turned to see who had received the Howler.

"—_**LETTER FROM DUMBLEDORE LAST NIGHT, I THOUGHT YOUR FATHER WOULD DIE OF SHAME, WE DIDN'T BRING YOU UP TO BEHAVE LIKE THIS, YOU AND HARRY COULD BOTH HAVE DIED—I AM ABSOLUTELY DISGUSTED—YOUR FATHER'S NOW FACING AN INQUIRY AT WORK, IT'S ENTIRELY YOUR FAULT AND IF YOU PUT ANOTHER TOE OUT OF LINE WE'LL BRING YOU STRAIGHT BACK HOME.**_"

Arielle's ears were ringing as silence fell. The red envelope burst into flames and curled into ashes. Ron was basically invisible under the table now, and Harry looked stunned. Eventually, a few people laughed and the normal morning chatter resumed.

Hermione closed her book and looked at the top of Ron's head. "Well, I don't know what you expected, Ron, but you—" she began.

"Don't tell me I deserved it," Ron snapped.

Arielle finished her breakfast in silence, but Harry had pushed away his porridge, looking sick with guilt.

Professor McGonagall was moving along the Gryffindor table, handing out course schedules as if Howlers arrived every day and it no longer affected her.

Arielle looked her schedule over quickly. There was Herbology three times a week and even and Astronomy class at midnight one day a week. The first years' first class on Monday was History of Magic, and Arielle couldn't help but roll her eyes at the irony. She knew this subject better than anyone in the school could claim to know it, with the only possible exceptions being Hermione and the professor himself—mainly because he had been around for most of it. It may have been three years since Arielle had been allowed to see Bathilda, but she remembered a lot of the stories—memories she clung to as the only thing that made looking back bearable. Now she had to deal with it on her first day. _Great_, she thought. _Just great_.

"Harry, where's the History of Magic classroom?" Arielle asked.

"Uh, first floor—you go down the corridor and the door's around there," Harry said before leaving for the greenhouses with Ron and Hermione.

"Thanks," Arielle said, a little sardonically, "that's really helpful."

"Do you know where we're going?" Ginny asked.

"Slightly," Arielle said. "Come on, we're going to be late anyway.

***

As it turned out, Harry's directions were accurate, but they were not good enough and the girls had to double back at the end of the corridor and sprint into the classroom to be on time. History of Magic was too boring to keep Arielle's attention, especially when she already knew the key points of the lecture without listening for more than a minute. She was a little peeved that the teacher was so boring, but she supposed that, when one is dead, he or she loses the teaching flair after a while.

The rest of her classes were much more interesting, even if they had more of a challenge to them. Herbology out in the greenhouses behind the castle was already her worst subject, she knew, because taking care of plants was not something she could do no matter how hard she tried. The only thing she knew she definitely _could_ do in that class was learn how to use the various plants and fungi. Professor Sprout, while not terribly strict, did not seem like the kind of witch to take kindly to having her plants mutilated, so proceeding with caution in that class seemed to be the right thing in Arielle's opinion.

The first year Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs were on their way back from Herbology the first day when a few of the escaped pixies flew into the corridor and straight at the first years. The group scattered as the pixies clawed and bit at the students. Arielle was trying to smack the pixies away when two flew up behind her and grabbed her by the ears, dragging her into the air. She cried out in pain; her ears weren't meant to support that kind of weight. Smacking at the pixies, she twisted until, suddenly, her ears didn't hurt anymore, but there was a sharp pain in her ankle as her feet hit the flagstone floor.

There were more people in the hall to watch now, but only a few of them seemed to care that she didn't know how to protect herself from the electric blue creatures. They either just kept walking, or laughed none-too-quietly and began gossiping about the "ickle first year who couldn't handle pixies." Arielle tried to stand and winced when her right ankle protested the weight. Ginny was there helping her stand, but she had no way to walk.

Then, almost out of nowhere, Harry was rushing over to see if she was alright. Ron and Hermione seemed oblivious as they were arguing over some unimportant thing.

"Can you walk on it?" Harry asked, offering his arm for her to lean on, as Ginny had mysteriously disappeared when he showed up. _Probably writing in that stupid diary again_, Arielle thought.

"Walk on it? I can barely _stand_ on it," she said in a low voice, hoping to avoid more rumours.

"You need to get to the Hospital Wing," Harry said, adjusting himself so he could help her limp up to the third floor.

After insisting that she only needed the ankle wrapped, to no avail, Arielle was released to go eat dinner in the thinning crowd in the Great Hall.

**

Defence Against the Dark Arts had become a bit of a joke since Cornish pixie "mishap". The first years' class was now taken up with an extended questionnaire about the teacher, Professor Lockhart himself. While the other girls had been fawning over him before, they had begun to see him as laughable.

Astronomy was vastly different from the other classes. Every Tuesday night, the first years could break curfew to go up to the Astronomy tower to observe the stars and galaxies at midnight Wednesday morning, and then go to sleep only to have the class again right after breakfast to discuss the magical meanings behind what was seen.

Charms was fast becoming Arielle's favourite class. It was taught by the tiny Professor Flitwick, who started with roll call and would get so excited by a subject at certain times and topple off the pile of books he stood on while teaching. Transfiguration had the most difficult subject matter, but it was interesting as well as challenging. Professor McGonagall gave the first years a strict lecture on not goofing off in class, then Transfigured a desk into a pig and back before dismissing the class.

Friday was the second day the girls made it to breakfast without getting lost, which was proof enough that they were well on their way to making it in Hogwarts. The constant gossiping whenever Arielle walked by wasn't stopping, though. So far, her only real friends in the school were Ginny, who had become quiet and introverted since they'd arrived at school, and Luna Lovegood, who was declared "Loony" for her belief in Crumple-Horned Snorkacks. She was friendly to Star and Colin and nice enough to the rest of her year mates, but they weren't really friends. The comments had gotten more hostile over the week, going from "Look at her hair!" and "Look at her face!" to "They barely look anything alike" and "It's a hoax; she's not related to Harry!" to, more recently, "Have you seen who she talks to? I'm not talking to her!" and "She's so _different_!" None of that even began to cover the mockery for the pixie incident on the first day. Her personality was being buried alive. While many people had noticed Malfoy's swollen eye, no one knew the specifics, much to Arielle's chagrin. Most of her meals were spent with—or near—Fred, George, and Lee, who was nice to Arielle, but only as a polite thing, not as a friend. The twins, of course, didn't notice the major change in Arielle or Ginny as they were far too occupied with their own problems.

After breakfast, the first year Gryffindors made their way to the dungeons for their last class of the week: double Potions. Everyone had heard rumours about the professor, but no one knew what to believe.

The dungeons were creepy, seeing as they were under the castle and much colder than the rest of the castle. The feeling wasn't alleviated by the half-formed animals floating in glass jars.

Professor Snape began the class with roll call, looking at each student as they responded in the positive to being present. He reached Arielle's name, but didn't even glance in her direction as she answered, "Here."

_O-kay, I'm now being ignored by teachers. By next week, no one will even acknowledge my existence_, Arielle mused. While she wouldn't have cared—and would have been even a little happy—about being ignored by this particular teacher, the simple fact that it wasn't just the students made her feel...contaminated seemed to be the only word for it, though it had bad connotations.

After finishing roll call, Snape began his explanation of what Potions class was and what would be learned, provided the class wasn't as "abysmally dim-witted as the usual bunch of students" he had to teach. Then the class was set the task of mixing a cure for boils. Arielle was working with Colin Creevey, who turned out to be Harry's biggest fan.

Surprisingly, Arielle found Potions to come rather easily to her. Her and Colin's potion was the exact shade of blue described in the textbook. It was perfect, but Snape was avoiding their cauldron like the plague. Unfortunately, Ginny was not gifted with the same natural ability, and as she added the final ingredient, Star's cauldron exploded and the potion leaked onto the floor. Ginny had singed her hair in the explosion.

"Idiot!" Snape shouted at her, clearing away the potion and cauldron with a wave of his wand. "You didn't allow the cauldron to simmer first, did you? That's a point from Gryffindor." Ginny clenched her fists and glared at Snape, but said nothing. He swept away as the bell rang for lunch. Ginny apologised about the cauldron, but Star didn't seem to care about it. Everyone just left quickly, glad that they had a break after lunch.

***

Over the next few weeks, the rumours circulating around Arielle's sudden appearance had settled down to murmurs, mainly because Arielle had tried to keep a low profile, which was a first. She went to class and did well, she talked about Quidditch—when people would listen—and she tried to eat around other people, though occasionally they'd move away or leave when she'd sit down with Ginny. At the flying lessons the second week, Arielle and Ginny were way ahead of their classmates, but everyone seemed more impressed with Ginny. A harder habit for Arielle to break was her people-watching and accidental eavesdropping, which she did absentmindedly and was labelled a freak for by Lavender Brown and Anita Chaisely—at separate times, of course.

Even after weeks of trying to be a normal girl, the only people who would talk to her—barring the Weasleys and Harry—were Luna, Lee, Colin, and Hermione. Arielle's usually bubbly personality was rarely seen anymore, and no one noticed: Harry had his own problems, Percy was off being a prat, the twins were involved with their pranks, and even Ginny cared more about her diary than her adoptive sister. Arielle couldn't remember the last time she felt that isolated. Then, after four weeks, something finally happened.

***

**A/N: Yes, you should be feeling really bad for Arielle right now, she's had it rough. Sorry about the last two paragraphs, I've been writing all day and I want the next part to be its own chapter, so you all are stuck with a cliffhanger. Please don't throw things at me.**

**Lavender is a bitch.**

**I figured some pixies would escape when the second years made a break for it, and wouldn't it be the luck of some poor, outcast first year to get targeted by them.**

**Arielle's facial structure is similar to Harry's, but she was red hair and hazel eyes while he has black hair and green eyes. Yes, they are related (don't believe every rumour you hear!). She could change her appearance (Metamorphmagus) but she doesn't.**

**Arielle has to be the little outcast, because if she weren't, her character would be Mary Sue like and then everything would crash around her ears. She has a pretty depressing history with a can-do attitude that people like to suppress.**

**Dying for feedback here! Pretty please? I updated rather quickly this time.**


	6. Chapter 5: Instinct

It was the last Tuesday in September, and everyone had settled into his or her new routine. Even the first years rarely got lost anymore. In other words, Hogwarts' pecking order seemed firmly established, which left Arielle just above rock bottom. After the first couple of weeks, this didn't even surprise her. What did surprise her was waking up that morning with the feeling that something was..._different_. Her instincts were telling her to hold her head high, something was going to change soon.

Any hope of that change had been basically obliterated when Arielle arrived in the Great Hall completely alone—Ginny had been writing in her diary and promised to meet her down there—and forced to sit by Percy, though the feeling in the pit of her stomach didn't go away. The ceiling of the Great Hall mimicked the dark overcast sky outside. Nothing was screaming _different_ to her. Ginny arrived a few minutes later looking a little pale from sleep. She began to eat in earnest, not really noticing what she was eating. Arielle finished her food and propped her elbow on the table, resting her head in her hand as she waited for Ginny to finish. She smiled faintly at Neville, the boy who was talking to Harry and Ron on the first day, to acknowledge his slight wave of greeting as her walked past to sit with two other boys from his year. Ginny finally finished eating and they headed towards the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom on the third floor.

Nothing in that class was ever relevant to practical defence against anything. Lockhart used the time to boost his ridiculous reputation; Arielle wrote _read _Magical Me_ to study for final exam_ at the top of her notes and stopped paying attention. She hadn't liked Lockhart before the pixies, but now he was the bane of her existence for the time being. She knew that he dragged Harry to the front of the class to demonstrate his accomplishments and was grateful that he at least had the sense enough not to do that to her.

When the bell rang to signal the end of class, Ginny and Arielle headed to the first floor to find an empty classroom to spend the break in. They were going to practice the Levitation Charm they had been working on in Charms class. They had reached the top of the last flight of stairs when Arielle, true to her clumsy nature, slipped and tumbled all the way down and hit the wall at the landing. Years of experiences like this had taught her to curl into a ball, protect her head, and not reach out to stop herself as that would probably result in further injury. Usually, Arielle would have gotten up and just laughed it off, but someone else had beaten her to that part. Many someones, actually.

She had fallen down the stairs in front of half the school, and not one of them was being subtle about seeing it. Arielle squeezed her eyes shut as she heard the laughter ringing out around her. She gathered her bag and stood, ignoring catcalls from immature students around her. Without waiting for Ginny, she pushed through the crowd to the first floor corridor, not realising she had shoved through Neville rather harshly until it was too late, and walked as quickly down the hallway as quickly as possible without running, searching for an empty classroom. When she found one, she hurried inside and sat at the furthest desk from the door.

_Do NOT cry_, she mentally scolded herself, blinking back the tears. _It's not worth it; they'll have won if you do. Nothing's changed, not really._ But it hurt; no one had even tried to help her.

Ginny found her a few minutes later, still sitting at the desk and staring at the floor absentmindedly. "You alright?" Ginny asked weakly, not really knowing what else to say.

"Peachy," Arielle replied dully, rolling her eyes but barely looking at Ginny.

"They don't matter, you know," Ginny said, putting her bag down near the front of the classroom.

"Sure." There was really nothing else to say on the subject; Ginny knew Arielle well enough to know basically what Arielle was thinking.

"You want to practice the charms now?"

"Go ahead, I'll watch. I don't really feel like doing anything right now." Arielle folded her arms on her desk and rested her chin on them.

The next forty-five minutes were spent pretty aimlessly. Arielle was nearly asleep when the lunch bell rang. Arielle grabbed her bag and waited for Ginny to find whatever she was looking for in hers, but it wasn't there.

"I've forgotten something, I need to go back to the tower. Want to come?" Ginny said.

Arielle shook her head. "I'll just go to lunch, get there before everyone who's going to mock me does."

Ginny shrugged but went up the stairs when Arielle went down to the ground floor. She had decided not to sit with her brothers today. Today, she was going to sit with the other Gryffindor girls near her age. It was impulsive and probably a little stupid, but she didn't want to hide anymore.

Upon entering the Great Hall, she noticed that the closer half of the Gryffindor table was almost filled, but the other half was practically empty. The last group before the empty half was second and third year girls and Kira Knighton, who had taken to hanging with Parvati. Arielle walked over to them slowly, looking around and seeing the twins watching her. She quickly looked away and back towards her chosen seat, next to Kira.

"Can I sit here?" she asked Kira, placing her bag on the floor and sitting down. Lavender looked up at the sound of her voice, then, seeing Arielle, quickly gathered her things and stood, nodding her head towards the full end of the table. The rest of the group got up and followed, Kira being the only one who looked a little hesitant before following her queen bee and leaving Arielle sitting alone halfway down the table.

The whirlwind of emotions Arielle felt were enough to make her feel sick. She was shocked, hurt, angry, and utterly at a loss for what to do. When she caught a glimpse of Lavender's slight smirk, she knew the hurt was apparent on her face and looked back at her plate, trying to control her breathing.

As she sat at the Gryffindor table alone, she felt grateful that at least her back was to the rest of the hall. She picked up a fork and began poking at the food on her plate, not feeling hungry at all. Her resolve not to break down was slipping, and she could feel a crowd of people walk past behind her to sit together further down the table, leaving her fully alone in the centre of everything.

_I could write about this_, she thought, scoffing internally at the idea. She could remember every other time she'd had to eat alone, and none of them were as harsh as this. Even by Fred and George she was basically alone when Ginny decided to sit around and write in her diary, but at least they'd acknowledge her—occasionally.

She had mashed her potatoes more than anyone in the kitchens would have thought possible when she felt another group of people stop by her.

"Can we sit here?" Arielle looked up at the owner of the voice, the sandy-haired boy who had asked Hermione about Harry and Ron at the feast. With him were a black boy who was probably taller than Ron and Neville.

"Sure," she said, a little confused but glad for the company. He sat across from her and Neville sat next to her, the third boy across from him.

"I'm Seamus Finnigan," the boy said. "This is Dean Thomas"—he gestured at the boy next to him—"and I think you know Neville."

Arielle nodded and smiled. "I'm Arielle Potter."

"So you _are_ related to Harry?" Dean asked.

Arielle sighed; she knew that was coming eventually. "Yeah, I am. It's a long story."

"I bet," Dean said, "and, judging by the shape of those potatoes, it's been a long day, too."

"Yeah, you're not wrong," Arielle agreed, and then she turned to Neville, adding, "Sorry for pushing you earlier; I didn't know who it was."

But Neville was already shaking his head. "You needed to get out. Don't worry about it."

"I'll never doubt anyone who says girls are the meaner ones again," Seamus said.

"We saw what they did," Dean explained. "They sat by us when they left you and were joking about it, so we got up and left them."

Arielle smiled at them. "Thanks. You didn't have to."

"Someone did," Seamus said. "I personally think Lavender needs to be taken down a peg or three."

Neville nodded and looked down the table. "She's giving us a death glare right now."

Arielle turned as well and noticed Lavender's angry eyes lock on hers. "That's all me," she said. "She thinks this is my fault, too."

"Glare right back, she deserves it," Seamus said, only half kidding.

Arielle turned away from Lavender and smiled. "Not worth it."

The four of them fell into casual conversation, eating in between sentences. They talked about everyday topics: Quidditch teams, sports (Arielle enjoyed football as much as Dean), school, and mysteries among the students.

"So does anyone know what happened to Malfoy's eye in the beginning of the year?" Dean asked. "No one who would know is likely to tell me anything."

"I'm telling you, one of his great stupid bodyguards was sick of following his around like a lost puppy and introduced his fist to the side of Malfoy's head," Seamus said.

Arielle laughed and shook her head. "That was me." All three boys stopped and stared at her, shocked. "It was! He came into the compartment where Hermione, Ginny, and I were sitting acting all 'Holier than thou' and talking about how if I joined him, he'd show me who the 'right people' are. Then he was rude about my life and about Hermione and Ginny, so I kind of...hit him." She shrugged.

Seamus and Dean grinned widely; Neville stared at her in wonder. "Brilliant!" Dean exclaimed.

"Welcome to Gryffindor!" Seamus said, laughing. "Why did no one talk to you before?" It was rhetorical, but as he said it, the question seemed to need an answer.

"Your guess is as good as mine," Arielle said. "I guess it's because I'm Harry's sister, but we don't really look that similar, and then I'd hang out with Ginny and Luna, and everyone thinks Luna's insane—which she's not. Guilt by association, probably." She shrugged.

"Yeah, you don't really look anything like Harry," Neville said, purposely ignoring the other half of her explanation.

"I could change that, but I don't want to," Arielle said.

"What do you mean?" Seamus asked, frowning slightly.

Arielle took a deep breath and concentrated her energy on turning her hair black. She leaned her head forward and noticed that there were black curls falling forward instead of dark red. The blue eyes in front of her widened in shock and there was a cry of shock from beside her.

"Holy—!" Seamus began, at a loss for words.

"What—? How did you—?" Dean asked.

"I'm a Metamorphmagus—I can change my appearance at will," Arielle explained quickly, brushing her hair back from her face as it returned to its usual red colour.

"That's—interesting," Neville said shakily. He obviously had not recovered from the shock.

Seamus, on the other hand, had recovered fully. "That's cool, actually."

Arielle felt her ears turning red; she wasn't used to people really caring about her Metamorphosing. "It'd be cooler if I could make myself taller," she joked. They laughed, and the bell to signal the end of lunch rang. "I'll see you all later; I have to go out to the greenhouses."

"Good luck with that; it's pouring outside," Dean said, looking towards the ceiling. Sure enough, the sky had opened up since breakfast. Arielle almost laughed at the irony.

"Maybe this class Professor Sprout will give up on having me handle the plants and let me learn through observation," Arielle said. She picked up her bag and waved at her new friends before walking towards the end of the hall searching for Ginny.

Ginny hadn't come down to lunch, but Arielle was not worrying about that at the moment. Finally, after a month, people were talking to her. She made her way out to the greenhouses in a much better mood than she'd been in since the first of September. Her instincts had been right, things were getting better.

*******

**A/N: I'm back after just one day. Thank you to those of you who have reviewed so far, you should see me trying not to jump around like a spaz when I get the notification about it :). I know it's short, but I don't find Herbology class important to the plot.**

**Don't be a Lavender! (Told you she is a bitch.)**

**I love the minor characters. They are major characters here. You'll see.**

**We've made it to October, readers! I promise that the rest of the series will be less dull, first year just sort of drags. _Looking for Truth_ will be much more involved, if that makes any sense (which it probably doesn't, sorry).**

**Edit 12-6-09: New poll up. Help me, it's on my profile. Also, this is on twitter, check it out! Love x!**


	7. Chapter 6: Right and Wrong

A couple of days later, Arielle was walking to the Great Hall with Ginny, who did not want to be there. Percy had forced her to go to the hospital wing after he insisted she looked rather pale. Ginny had argued with him, but he threatened to write to Mrs. Weasley and say that Ginny refused to take care of herself. Even two hours later, the smoke pouring from Ginny's ears coupled with her Weasley red hair made her head look like it was on fire, an impression that was only added to by the scowl she wore to dinner. Arielle was trying to distract her, but that plan was backfiring spectacularly; the conversation had turned to Arielle's eyesight.

"Mum's going to make you get glasses; you can't see the History notes from the back of the room," Ginny repeated for what seemed like the hundredth time.

Arielle rolled her eyes again. "I don't _need_ to see the History notes, I know them already. And if your mum doesn't know, she can't make me get the glasses."

"But it's not just History, it's all the time," Ginny said, "and eventually, the professors are going to catch on and make you see Madame Pomfrey. You may be able to convince Mum that you're fine, but once Madame Pomfrey says you're blind, there'll be no arguing with her."

"Well, then we'll just have to sit closer to the front so they _don't_ find out," Arielle said reasonably. She sat down at the nearly empty table; it was early still, and not many people had arrived.

"Oh, no, you are not dragging me down with you," Ginny said, joining her and filling her plate with anything in reach.

"But I don't want glasses." It was a lame excuse and she knew it. Hoping to avoid the rest of the conversation, Arielle began to eat.

"You aren't going to have a choice and you know it," Ginny said.

"About what?" Dean and Seamus had joined them at the table. Neither one of them knew what Ginny was talking about; Ginny was the only one besides Harry who knew Arielle needed glasses.

"Arielle insists that she'll be able to convince my mum and all the professors that she has perfect vision when she can't read the written notes from the back of the room," Ginny explained. "She's going to get glasses, she just won't admit it."

Dean grinned mischievously. "Really? How many fingers am I holding up?" He held up two, then five, then four.

"You're not funny," Arielle said, smiling.

"You're right: I'm hilarious. It's what makes me so special," Dean replied. He proceeded to accidentally half-miss his goblet while pouring pumpkin juice, soaking the tablecloth underneath.

"'Special' would be the right word for it," Seamus laughed as Dean scrambled to dry the newly orange fabric.

"Oh, shut up, all of you," Dean said, which just made the others laugh harder.

"I'm serious, though," Ginny said when they had all calmed down. "She needs glasses."

"Even if you _can_ hide it from the teachers—and I doubt that's possible, especially with McGonagall—how are you planning to keep it from your brothers?" Seamus asked.

"Harry knows," Arielle said, avoiding the question.

"Yeah, but you can bet Percy will find out," Ginny said enthusiastically. "He won't keep it from Mum!"

"How do you—?" Arielle began, but Ginny pointed at her still smoking head.

"You're going to have to get them," Ginny said triumphantly.

"Whose side are you on?" Arielle asked jokingly.

"I don't take sides, I make my own," Ginny said.

There was no point in arguing over it, so the topic was dropped. Dinner had become an enjoyable affair since the boys had started sitting with Arielle and Ginny. Arielle didn't feel like a complete outcast in the Great Hall anymore, and classes were tolerable since they mostly consisted of individual work.

Neville joined the quartet later on, explaining how he had been helping Professor Sprout with the mandrakes and that it had taken longer than expected. By this point, the meal was half over and the hall was filled with students.

Arielle became aware of someone approaching her tentatively and turned to see who it was. She was surprised to see Star standing there looking uncertain but determined; usually she ate with Kira, Parvati, and Lavender.

"Hey," she said, "can I sit with you guys?"

"Sure," Arielle said confusedly, shrugging.

"Thanks," she said, sitting but still looking at Arielle. "Listen, I heard about what they all did to you"—she gestured towards Lavender with a hand—"and at first I thought maybe they didn't mean to. But then today they were joking about it—well, Lavender and most of the older girls were, but Parvati was agreeing half-heartedly and I don't think Kira thought it was funny—and I figured they definitely did it on purpose." Star was scowling indignantly. "That's just not right. So I told them to stuff it and left."

Arielle was staring at Star, not knowing what to say. She was really grateful for what her classmate had done.

"Then you'll sit with us," Ginny said before Arielle could reply.

"Definitely," Arielle agreed. "Thank you," she added.

"Don't worry about it," Star said. "Someone had to tell them to shut it eventually."

***

The month flew by, and soon the castle was filled with the scents of the Halloween feast. Ginny had not really gotten any better as a result of the Pepper-Up potion and was still as pale as she had been at the beginning of October. The past week in particular she had been distinctly distant. Arielle and Star were worried about her; all she did nowadays was write furiously in her diary.

Arielle was sitting with Harry, Ron, and Hermione in the common room listening to them argue over the feast. Apparently, Harry had gone and promised Nearly-Headless Nick that he'd go to Nick's 500th deathday party and now was regretting that decision, and Hermione, who had made no such promise, would not let him back out.

"Hermione," Harry began again, exasperated with the whole situation, "he even said that tons of his friends were coming from all over the country. He probably won't even notice if we aren't there. He said he'd understand if we'd rather go to the feast."

"Of course he'd say that, Harry, anyone would," Hermione said. "Can't you _tell_ how much this means to him?"

"Well—" Harry said.

"Just let it go, Harry. She won't let you skip it," Arielle finally interceded, tired of the pointless debate.

"A promise is a promise," Hermione said bossily. "You _said_ you'd go to the deathday party."

Harry did not look happy but stopped trying to finagle his way out of the party. Arielle felt bad for him—and for Ron, who was sitting in sullen silence next to Harry after being told he was going as well—but it was his own stupid fault for promising to go in the first place.

Arielle walked with them down to the Entrance Hall, where she left to enter the Great Hall with the rest of the school and the other three proceeded to the dungeons. It was only after she sat down that she noticed that someone else was missing.

"No Ginny again today?" Seamus asked as he sat down, not looking at all surprised.

"I don't know what's _wrong_ with her! She isn't sick, or else the potion Madame Pomfrey gave her would have healed her," Arielle said.

"People change at school," Neville said reasonably.

"Not this much, not this fast," Arielle said, looking around for Star, who was there in a matter of moments.

"Hey, Ginny says she isn't coming; she's really tired," Star said. "I'm worried about her."

"Me too. Does she feel sick, or just tired?" Arielle asked, concerned.

"She only said she needed to rest, that she didn't feel up to coming to the feast. I'll admit, she looked knackered," Star said. She shared a look with Arielle that expressed their mutual worry; this was not a good sign.

The rest of the feast was enjoyable. Most worries were forgotten by the time Fred and George's fireworks went off (at least, it was assumed that they were the twins', for no one else was likely to cause such a scene at the feast) and the hundreds of live bats took to the air in a terrified frenzy, resulting in shrieks from the frightened student body. The young witches and wizards left the Great Hall feeling full and sleepy.

The happy feeling didn't last very long. As the prefects led the Gryffindors back to the seventh floor, the relaxed chatter stopped abruptly, and the students in the front of the mass gasped in horror.

"What's going on?" Lee Jordan asked from somewhere to Arielle's right.

"I can't see anything up there," Dean said, craning his neck to see over the crowd of people in front of him.

"I'll go see," Arielle said, knowing that, as the smallest, she'd be able to get the front the quickest. She started to shoulder her way through the crowd.

At the front was one of the strangest and most disturbing things she had ever seen. There were Harry, Ron, and Hermione, standing in the middle of a flooded corridor. Hanging by her tail from a torch bracket on the wall was Mrs. Norris, Filch's cat. And above her, written in letters so red they could have been blood, was a warning:

THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN

OPENED. ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE.

*******

**A/N: Sorry it's been so long! I meant to have this posted last week, but it didn't happen because I have serious writer's block (which is also why this is such a short chapter.) I'm begging you, do not let me write a first year fic AGAIN! Please?**

**I just need to let you all know a couple of things. One, the _Shadows Behind the Smile_ series is a twitter page--if I get enough followers there, I'll give updates on the story's progress, answer questions, ask for inspiration, etc. The link is on my profile (I think): ShadowedSmile00. Two, I have a poll up about how to continue with the series (yes, I'm going to finish this fic and then go to 2nd year, don't worry). Please vote, I need advice.**

**Sorry about the semi-cliffie, but you basically know this story, so don't be too angry? Please? I'll try to write soon!**


	8. Chapter 7: Unqualified and Victimized

_Just ignore her and maybe she'll stop_, Arielle thought, pulling her blankets up closer to her chin and curling up. The pillow made contact with her side a few moments later, shattering her hope of sleeping in.

"Get up, lazy!" Ginny said, grabbing the blankets and attempting to pull them out of Arielle's grip. "It's the first Quidditch match! You can't miss it."

Arielle mumbled something unintelligible and rolled onto her back. "Star, what time is it?"

"Half seven," Star replied sleepily. She had obviously been pulled from her bed by the suddenly energetic Ginny.

Arielle glared unfocusedly at Ginny. "The match doesn't start for _two and a half hours_. Why am I awake?" she asked. She would have been angrier if this wasn't the most Ginny-like Ginny had been in a couple of months.

"Because you take forever to wake up and get ready, and I'm not missing the match 'cause of you." Ginny was pulling back the drapes around Arielle's four-poster bed, letting in far too much sunlight to be decent.

"Ugh, do not."

"Then prove it."

Arielle glared at Ginny one more time before accepting the challenge and getting up.

***

"What is he _doing_?" Arielle shouted over the storm, watching as Harry zoomed haphazardly around the field trying to avoid the Bludger that began tailing him the moment he took to the skies. Before the timeout, the twins had been trying to save him, but either Harry had ditched them or, more likely, Wood had called the twins off. Either way, it was not working out well for Harry, even if the Chasers were doing better now that the second Bludger was not able to get as close.

"That Bludger's been tampered with; they _never _target one player like this," Hermione said, looking very worried.

"Are the Slytherins really that pathetic?" Star asked. She made eye contact with Arielle and they both answered, "Yes they are."

"And after an hour of dodging, the Bludger has finally caught up with Potter! That had to hurt!" Lee announced and Harry slid dangerously on his broom. "That Bludger has been tampered with! Dirty, cheating Slytherin bastards!"

"JORDAN!"

"Sorry, Professor. It looks like Potter's attacking Malfoy. Get him, Harry—just a joke, Professor—wait, is that the Snitch? It is—and Potter's heading for land. Someone get Madam Pomfrey, that arm is broken," Lee advised. "And—POTTER'S GOT THE SNITCH! GRYFFINDOR WINS!"

Arielle jumped the five foot wall to the stands and landed with a huge splatter in the mud on her way to Harry. George had captured the rogue Bludger and was wrestling with it on the side. Arielle ran across the pitch as fast as she could without losing her shoes to the mud. She made it to him just in time for Lockhart to pull out his wand.

"No, don't!" she said as he waved it at Harry's broken arm. The arm instantly went limp.

***

"Lockhart's really outdone himself this time," Arielle said sarcastically when she made it back to the common room, still covered in mud from the pitch. "I mean, really, how did an idiot like _him_ ever become a professor?"

"Harry told that git not to try to fix it. He just needed to go to the Hospital Wing; Madam Pomfrey can fix broken bones in her sleep," Ron said.

The entire common room was buzzing with gossip about the match. It was impossible to hold a conversation in the middle of the confused babble. The mood of the chatter was clear though: excitement mixed with anger over what happened to the team's Seeker and happiness over the win. Arielle could hear some of the girls trying to defend Lockhart's blunder and was resisting the impulse to literally knock some sense into them.

Suddenly, she noticed Colin making a break for the portrait hole, camera in hand. She forced herself though the crowd towards him.

"Hey, Arielle," he said when he noticed her, "I'm going to see how Harry's doing." He was trying to make his camera as inconspicuous as possible and failing miserably.

"Colin, I _don't_ think Harry wants a picture of himself lying in a hospital bed with a rubber tube for an arm." She was giving him a don't-make-this-harder look.

"Well, I thought I might find a way into the kitchens. Food always makes people feel better, right?" He looked a little like a lost puppy, and Arielle let up a little.

"Food's always good," she said, grinning. "You might want to talk to the twins; they know where almost everything is."

"Great, see you later," Colin waved and turned towards the table Fred and George were loading with food.

Arielle went in search of Star and Ginny, finding Star standing by the food table. Fighting the crowd once more, Arielle made her way over to her friend.

"Have you seen Ginny?" Star asked.

"Not since we got back to the common room, why?" Arielle answered.

"Me either, she's vanished again."

Arielle didn't have to voice her concerns; they were visible on her face and mirrored on Star's. Something felt off about Ginny's disappearances, but neither of them could place exactly what it was. Arielle hoped that Ginny was okay.

***

Arielle awoke the next morning with a feeling that something was very, very off. It scared her how strong the feeling of _wrongness_ was, as she had been learning to regard these feelings as something like true intuition. She got dressed uneasily, worried that something had happened to Ginny or even Harry. She hadn't seen Ginny the rest of the night and had only heard Ginny enter the dorm right before she, Arielle, fell asleep.

Pulling a zip-up jumper on over her shirt, she walked out of the dorm with a sense of foreboding. Arielle entered the common room and didn't notice anything drastically different. She wondered if she was just being ridiculous as she stood at the bottom of the staircase and looked around the common room. She almost jumped a mile when she heard Seamus call her from across the room.

She looked over quickly in alarm, then smiled at him as she relaxed and joined him by the notice board. _I really am losing it_, she thought, almost completely shaking her feeling of unease. The worried look of Seamus's face was the only thing that made her hold on to the feeling.

"What's up?" she asked him, sensing, again, that something was wrong.

"Did you hear about Colin?"

Panicky unease slammed into her stomach as if someone had punched her from the inside. She was fighting to control her breathing and keep her face from showing her concern, battles she was slowly losing. Feeling hollow except for the too-fast beating of her heart, she asked, "What happened?"

"People are saying the professors found him on the stairs Petrified like Filch's cat," Seamus said. "You okay? You look sick."

_I feel sick_, Arielle thought as she struggled to process this new information in her panicking mind. She shook her head slowly. "Don't worry about it. I _knew_ something felt wrong. I didn't think it was real..."

"Slow down, you're babbling. What are you talking about?"

"Honestly," Arielle said, "I don't know. I could just sort of _sense_ that something bad had happened. It's weird and totally unspecific. I guess it's sort of like, I don't know, intuition or something, but it's not. Ugh, I wish I understood it."

"Alright, I've worried you entirely too much for first thing in the morning. Let's get breakfast, yeah? Then maybe we'll figure out what's going on."

Arielle let Seamus lead her out of the common room, knowing that they both knew breakfast wasn't really going to solve the problem.

*******

**A/N: Sorry I'm the worst person ever about updating! I have not just been putting it off, though. I've finished outlining for Finding Her Place and begun for Looking For Truth. I've discovered that there are interesting and faster paced parts in this story, just later in the year, and I have been trying to write this chapter for a month. I know it's short, but there really isn't much else to say on the matter.**

**Vote in the poll on my profile, yeah? Please?!**

**Reviews are lovely, and potentially helpful.**

**P. S. Who else loves Lee as the commentator? His and the twins' language is the main reason for the T rating. Not for long, though!**

**Love you!**


	9. Chapter 8: A Tie to the Past, pt 1

The weeks following the attack on Colin were charged with suspicious energy. Arielle's fellow first years never ventured out into the hallways alone anymore. People talked in hushed voices, and laughter was scarcely heard and usually came out unnaturally loud and hollow. The attack on Mrs. Norris had been played off as some sort of joke since everyone wanted her to disappear at one point. Now that a student had been attacked, especially a first year with no real enemies, the Heir of Slytherin's threat held some weight in the minds of everyone in the school.

Ginny was particularly distressed when she heard about Colin. She had actually taken the news worse than Arielle had. Arielle believed it was because Colin sat next to her in Charms and she was already stressed from classes. She wasn't, however, clinging to people in the hallways and actually seemed more isolated after the incident. Fred and George claimed that they were trying to cheer her up, and Arielle, though slightly sceptical, believed them—

—Until she was around for one of their "cheering up" methods.

She knew they thought it was just funny. She knew they weren't trying to hurt anyone.

But she also knew that there was no possible way they hadn't planned their latest trick for when she was right by Ginny. Especially not when she knew that _they_ knew she was arachno-phobic. Pretending a giant spider was attacking Fred's head right in front of Arielle, and then tossing the wiggling fake spider at the two terrified girls was not an accident, nor was it ever intended to be. Arielle had flipped out, screaming at her two brothers for being such jerks before refusing to talk to them.

For two weeks.

"Hey, Arielle!"

Arielle ignored George as she continued to watch the early December sky, searching for signs of snow. It had been overcast all day, and Arielle was hoping to see the first few snowflakes fall.

She could feel the twins on either side of her, trying to get her attention with their presence. She was sitting in an open window on the third floor, her legs dangling outside with her arm wrapped around the frame to stabilize her, and her back was still to the twins.

"Look, we're _really sorry_ about the spider thing," Fred said.

"It was totally uncalled for," George added.

"Way out of line."

"And Ginny's talking to us again—"

"—Well, as much as she talks nowadays—"

"—And we _really_ wish you'd talk, too," George finished. "We don't deal too well with silence."

Arielle pulled her legs back inside and spun around on the windowsill to face the boys. She looked between the two boys, taking in their dramatically begging eyes and identical pouts, before saying, "So what do you two need from me?"

The pouts became looks of mock outrage. Fred recoiled sharply and pressed a hand dramatically over his heart. "Why do you assume that we, your adoring brothers, need something from you in order to be on speaking terms with you again?"

"Well, a few things," Arielle said, half joking, "one, you _never_ want to hear me talk; two, you two don't pout unless you want something; three, I've known you long enough to know that you only plan what you're going to say if it has to do with mischief and mayhem, and that apology could not have been more rehearsed."

"In that order: usually true, there's no other reason to pout, and it's always more fun to make stuff up as we go along," George laughed.

"But since you _are_ talking to us again," Fred added, feigning innocence, "we may sort of need your help with something Lee found."

Arielle smirked and raised an eyebrow, amused by the twins' method of asking for help. "What do you need exactly?" she asked.

"We'll show you!"

And with that, Arielle was being pulled through the corridors by the twins. She was trying to keep track of the path that they took mentally, since she'd never seen this part of the castle before. She figured they were on the fourth floor, and was proven right as they hurried past the library. After a sharp right down a narrow side hallway, she could see Lee, who was tapping the stone wall with his wand and then glaring at it when nothing happened.

"It won't budge," he said irritably when Fred and George stopped.

"And you're sure you saw the brick move?" George said.

"Yes! I told you, it definitely lit up from the inside," Lee said. "Oh, hey, Lexxie," he added, noticing her for the first time.

"Hey, Lee. 'Arielle' still too difficult to remember?" she joked.

"I'm working on it," he replied. "Why did they bring you?"

Arielle laughed, "You ask that as if they ever tell me anything. What's up with the wall?"

"Well, right now all it'll do is glow randomly," Lee said, "but we're hoping it'll lead to a new passage out of the school."

"Which, if the opening you _think_ you saw is the size you said, none of us will be able to fit into it," Fred said.

"So you want me to be the test subject," Arielle said, finishing his thought.

"Are you in or not?" George asked, avoiding the accusation in her voice.

"Fine, but you owe me."

The boys began to work on the wall, trying various spells on the wall with the same results—or lack thereof. After a few minutes of this, Arielle grew bored and began to examine the wall. This was about as interesting as watching grass grow until she noticed a pinprick of light in the lower left hand corner of one of the bricks. She moved closer to this light, which came from a hole that may have had a shape if the light weren't obscuring its edges. Arielle felt the sudden urge to touch where the light was coming from and reached up slowly, her fingers covering the light at the same time that Lee tapped the brick with his wand.

There was a loud scraping noise and Arielle backed away as the brick slid back into the wall and out of sight, leaving a hole just big enough for a small person to squeeze through.

"_Excellent!_" the twins exclaimed.

"I told you I wasn't imagining things," Lee said.

"Alright, Arielle, you're up," George said.

Arielle sighed, "Help me, I can't reach that high."

Eventually, Arielle had managed to scramble halfway through the wall. The twins, who were no longer helping her climb, were now coaching her on what to do inside the unknown space.

"Look around for any way to make this hole big enough for us to get through."

"If there's anything interesting, let us know."

"Try not to get stuck in there."

"You two are so _not_ helpful," Arielle panted, heaving herself completely through the hole into a dark stone room. The only light came from the opening she had come through. She lit her wand and used that light to look around the room.

It was a small, square room completely devoid of furnishings. There were torch brackets in the wall with unused torches placed inside. The only thing in this room that was different from the pattern of stones in building the walls was a crude carving of an unfamiliar coat of arms on the far wall. There were two enormous paw prints, a mark like a cloven hoof, and what may have been a mouse's paw all surrounding a large, ornate letter M.

Arielle could sense the importance of this sign and moved closer to it, lighting a torch in its bracket along the way. As she reached the wall, she could sense a glow coming from each element of the coat of arms as well. Without truly registering what she was doing, she lightly traced the outline of the hoof print, followed by the outline of the M.

The sound of stone sliding past stone brought her back to reality. She spun around and saw the brick slowly moving back into place. She sprinted back to the hole, which was too small even for her now, and shouted for Fred and George.

"What's happening?" she yelled to them.

"We don't know!" George answered her, panic obvious in her voice.

"Um—Lee, try that spell again. Maybe it'll open the wall again," Fred said.

Arielle heard the sound of a wand smacking against brick, followed by a discouraged "It's not working!"

"What do you mean '_it's not working_?'" Arielle shouted.

"Shit! Arielle, don't worry, we're going to get you—"

Fred's voice was cut off as the brick finished sliding back into place, and Arielle was left alone in the complete silence of this unknown room. Arielle put her back to the wall and slid down it, trying to keep her breathing even as her heart beat an uneven, panicked tempo.

Then, out of nowhere, she heard something. It sounded like a voice.

"Is anyone here?" she called, not really expecting an answer.

There was a loud whooping, bark-like cheer and the sound Arielle had heard came back more clearly in the form of a voice.

_Finally, I was beginning to think none of us had any luck once we left school. Whose are you?_

Arielle was thrown for a loop; this voice didn't appear to have any natural origin. The good-tempered, joking voice was unfamiliar to Arielle, but it made her feel safe for a reason she didn't understand. "I'm sorry, what?" she asked, but it appeared there was more than once voice there, and they were now having a short argument and didn't hear her.

_Padfoot, that is _not_ a good way to start a conversation._

_Sorry, Mum,_ the first voice joked.

_Aw, lighten up, Moony. We haven't had a visitor since we sealed the room._

"I'm losing it," Arielle muttered to herself, feeling it would be just her luck to get a mental illness while trapped in a secluded room. She couldn't help but be amused by the voices' conversation. "What's going on?" she asked in a louder voice.

_Sorry about them,_ the reasonable voice said,_ they're just—well, they're morons, really. I'm Moony. The first one of us you talked to would be Padfoot—_

_Hi!_ said Padfoot excitedly.

_And last but not least is Prongs. We are three of the four Marauders at Hogwarts, or we were at Hogwarts, but I'm hoping that if you're here that we all graduated at some point._

_Har har, Moony._ said Prongs. _My marks are almost as good as yours. Padfoot may have gotten by on pity and looks alone, but I pull my weight._

_I resent that,_ Padfoot interjected.

_Will you two shut it for a minute? I need to explain this to her. Good, well, as I was saying, there are four of us, but Wormtail apparently never got to cast his spell, so we'll have to do without him. Since you got in here, you must be related to one of us. that's just how the spell works. Welcome to the Marauder's Pass._

**A/N: I'm awful, I know! I'm sooooo sorry I haven't updated sooner! And then I left on a cliffhanger. But that means I'll be back.**

**No, the room is not a giant horcrux.**

**The twins language and the bickering/comments of the Marauders is the reason this is rated T. You may think the Marauder's Pass is stupid now, but it's necessary for a side plot in the sixth installment (yeah, SIXTH. It'll get better, I know this is rough.) And I didn't figure Wormtail (traitorous little...) would be powerful enough to cast the kind of spell necessary for the room, so he's not there. Deal with it.**

**Rereading the series. I keep noticing little hints all throughout that only make sense to me now that I've read the whole series and have read the earlier ones multiple times... I'll stop babbling now, sorry. Don't hate me?**


	10. Chapter 9: A Tie to the Past, pt 2

"'The Marauder's Pass'?" Arielle asked, still not entirely sure she was conscious.

_Yep, the Marauder's Pass_, Padfoot answered excitedly._ It's really great because the only people who can find and open the Pass are people with Marauder blood in them._

"But I'm not the one who found it, Lee is. Lee Jordan," she added. "And my brother's been in Hogwarts for a year already and I don't think he knows about this place."

_Hmm,_ Moony said, _well, maybe the room was trying to find a way to alert you by showing itself to one of your friends. As for your brother, maybe he hasn't been near here yet._

_Which brings me back to my question,_ Padfoot interjected. _Whose are you?_

"Um," Arielle said, "well, my name's Arielle Potter, does that help?"

There was a cacophony of whooping from Padfoot and Prongs. _You're Prongsie's! Yeah! _Padfoot cheered.

Arielle was laughing; this was completely mental. She was lying in the hospital wing in a coma, not in a room created by her father and his friends. There was just no way it was real, except…

_What's your mum's name?_ Prongs asked, sounding like he was fighting to keep his hopes down.

:"Lily—" Arielle was cut off by more cheers.

_Guys, cool it, you're freaking her out_, Moony said.

_Sorry_, Prongs said, _it's just—Evans? Really?_ He laughed, sounding relieved.

_What year is it?_ Moony asked.

"1992, why?"

_We would have graduated in 1978, and you must have been born in 1981 if you're a first year, and since your brother has been here for a year, he was born in 1980…_

_Do you have a point, Moony?_ Padfoot asked lazily.

_Just that Prongs had to have married Lily less than a year out of Hogwarts…_

_I don't see the problem,_ Prongs said.

_It means that the war had to have gotten worse. You know Lily; she doesn't rush into things for no good reason. Is the war still going on?_

"No, but it did get worse," Arielle said, a heavy weight falling into her heart. She had to tell them what happened to her parents. "Voldemort"—there was a sharp intake of breath—"was getting stronger by the day, and he came after my parents and my brother. I wasn't at the house because I was born really early and had to stay at St. Mungo's, but most people either didn't know I existed or else thought I didn't survive. He somehow got to them and he killed both of them, and then went after my brother, but he couldn't kill him. No one knows why, but his powers were broken and he's gone into hiding." Arielle had said all of this in one breath and stood in the middle of the room, breathing deeply and waiting for a response. She never thought she'd have to tell anyone that, since it was the most infamous night of the century.

_Prongs and Evans…died?_ Padfoot said in a sad, quiet voice.

Arielle nodded, then, not knowing whether they could see her, she said, "Yeah. I'm sorry."

_Don't worry about it, there's nothing that we can do,_ Moony said.

_Yeah,_ Prongs said, trying to sound nonchalant. _Hey, let's explain how the room works, shall we?_

_Alright_, said Padfoot with cheeriness in his voice that came across as fake. _Well, you saw the coat of arms on the wall, obviously. Well, the hoof, which is Prongs', closes the room, and the M either summons us or shuts us off. Always do that before you leave. Now, the larger paw print is Moony's, opens back out onto the fourth floor where you probably found us. You can only get into here from the castle on the fourth floor. The slightly smaller print is mine; it opens a path to Hogsmeade. The other way into the Marauder's Pass is through the trapdoor in the village. Now, the mouse print opens a path up to the seventh floor just around the corner from the Fat Lady's portrait. That one is exit only, but it's really useful is you're running from Filch and need a quick escape, since he can't open this place. You are Gryffindor, right?_

"Yeah," Arielle said, trying to process all that information.

_Oh, don't tell anyone what's in here if you can manage it,_ Moony said.

"Of course," Arielle said, grinning at the idea that she would know a way out of the castle that Fred and George couldn't know about. Then she remembered that the twins were probably still trying to get her out and she had been in the Marauder's Pass for the better part of an hour. "Um, guys, I have to go. The twins are probably still trying to get me out and they won't keep the professors out of it for much longer."

_Okay, just trace the M and then the large paw print._

"'Kay." Arielle did as she was told, feeling rather than seeing the three inhabitants disappear. She extinguished her torch before opening the room again. She could hear people shouting at each other outside the room and climbed back out of the room to see the twins having a shouting match with Harry.

"I still can't believe you sent her in there alone!" Harry yelled, hands clenched at his sides.

"We didn't _make_ her do anything, she said she would," George retorted.

Arielle looked around; the twins were so engrossed in their battle with Harry that they hadn't noticed the wall open. She looked past them and made eye contact with Lee, who was the only one who had noticed her return. He gestured to the twins as if to ask if he should tell them, but Arielle just rolled her eyes and shook her head.

Harry was still freaking out, "—she could be hurt, or be suffering from lack of oxygen, or—"

"Or waiting for you to shut up and help her out of the wall," Arielle said over him. Her brothers just stared, too shocked to speak. "Or not," she said, pulling herself out of the hole and landing on the floor with a _thud_.

"How did you get out?" Fred asked.

Arielle shrugged, saying, "I dunno, but it's a dead end, so you can't really use it, anyway."

"Rotten luck, Lee," George said, and Lee just shrugged.

"You sure you're alright?" Harry asked.

Arielle felt bad keeping the room from him, but she felt that this was the one thing she had to keep to herself. "Yeah, I'm fine."

"I'm _so_ sorry, Ar—Lexxie!" Lee said, forgetting for a moment that he was pretending not to know her name.

Arielle laughed. "It's really not your fault. And I _knew _you knew my name!"

"Um, no I don't?"

Arielle rolled her eyes. "Whatever. The twins dragged me up here, so technically—"

"Wait, wait, wait, _hold it_!" Fred said.

"You're _not_ going to blame us for this," George said.

"Yeah, and not just because you just started speaking to us again."

"You _agreed _to go in there!"

The twins seemed to be at a loss for words and just stood there gaping at her. Arielle smiled and said, "I'm just saying who I'm going to blame if anyone asks. Relax."

"'Cause that makes it better," Fred muttered.

"Let's just get down to dinner. You putting my life in danger made me hungry," Arielle joked, dodging the swing Fred took at the back of her head.

Over the next couple of weeks, more and more students could be seen walking through the corridors with a strange assortment of so-called protective talismans attached to their bodies. Arielle had already told Neville off for having so little confidence in himself that he resorted to fake amulets.

"You are _not_ almost a Squib, Neville!" she shouted for what felt like the hundredth time. She was past feeling awkward about Neville's statements about his alleged unworthiness. "You just need to believe in yourself."

"Believing in myself isn't going to improve my Potions marks."

"Snape has _never_ graded anyone fairly, least of all Gryffindors, and besides, there are tons of brilliant wizards who can't brew the simplest of potions," Arielle said, feeling she may be on to something. "Look at your Herbology marks; you're one of the best in your class. You and I both know that _my_ Herbology skills are nonexistent."

Neville looked less gloomy as he thought about Herbology. "Yeah, I guess you're right, but that's not going to matter to Slytherin's heir."

"You're worth more than the Slytherins combined," Arielle said. "You're a good person, which isn't something I can say about them."

Neville actually laughed at this. "You and your brother," he said. "You've both told me I'm worth more than Slytherins."

"Well, maybe you should start believing it."

Arielle was walking with Ginny and Star to the Great Hall in the third week of December when she noticed a new flyer pinned to the notice board.

"Duelling Club?" Star said. "How is that going to help if the attacker is a monster?"

"It's not," Arielle said, peering up at the notice. "Three guesses as to who thinks it _will_ help."

"Oh, be quiet," Star said. Arielle shared an exasperated look with Ginny.

"What do you reckon?" Ginny asked.

"We may as well go; it could help in the future," Arielle said.

**A/N: The room _is important_! Just not right now. I did need to get Lee back into the story because he's VERY important in so many of the later stories. The scene with Neville is just to show how Arielle instills confidence in people, and it is _not_ a little-kidsy love scene. I added the last two scenes just to make the chapter longer. Tomorrow's my last day of exams, so happy almost-summer! Review? Love ya!**


	11. Chapter 10: Duelling Club

When Arielle arrived in the Great Hall, the house tables had vanished to make room for the glittering golden stage along one wall. The theatrics surrounding the set-up only served to confirm her suspicions on the students' secret duelling teacher, but she continued to move through the crowd of people until she reached Seamus, Dean, Neville, Ginny, and Star.

"I wonder what we'll be learning," Seamus was saying excitedly as she reached the group.

"Judging from the looks of that stage, nothing that will be helpful on much more than a Puffskein problem," Arielle replied. Dean smirked; he seemed to have come to the same conclusions she had.

Seamus shook his head, though. "Even if it _is_ him, he can't be working alone! Duels need two people."

"No one's going to do anything flashy against him, they can't guarantee he'll know how to save himself," Dean argued, sounding exasperated. Arielle got the feeling they'd been having versions of this conversation throughout the day to no avail.

"I can't imagine anyone good being willing to work with him on this. Definitely not McGonagall, anyway." Now Arielle was racking her brains to figure out who was the co-conspirator in this little get-together.

"Maybe it'll be Flitwick; I heard he used to be a Duelling champion," Seamus offered hopefully.

Lockhart chose that moment to make his entrance, his opulent plum robes looking better-suited for an important meeting than for training a duelling club. "Brace yourselves," Arielle murmured, watching the Defence professor warily.

"Gather round, gather round!" Lockhart called, waving an arm for silence. "Can everyone see me? Can you all hear me? Excellent!

"Now, Professor Dumbledore has granted me permission to start this little duelling club, to train you all in case you ever need to defend yourselves as I myself have done on countless occasions—for full details, see my published works."

Arielle rolled her eyes. _He's a walking advertisement, not a teacher_.

"Let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape—" Seamus muffled an agitated sound as Snape glided onto the stage "—He tells me he knows a tiny little bit about duelling himself and has sportingly agreed to help me with a short demonstration before we begin. Mow, I don't want any of you youngsters to worry—you'll still have your Potions master when I'm through with him, never fear!"

"Not that I was particularly worried, but that's a bit of a disappointment," Dean muttered. Those within earshot chuckled quietly.

Lockhart was still grinning like a fool as Snape turned to sneer at him. The two professors squared off, bowing to each other. Well, if it could be considered bowing: Lockhart twirled his hands so much as he bowed low that it looked more like dancing than a gesture of politeness, while Snape barely moved his head to acknowledge his opponent. Both then raised their wands like swords.

"As you see, we are holding our wands in the accepted combative position," Lockhart explained unnecessarily. "On the count of three, we will cast our first spells. Neither of us will be aiming to kill, of course."

Arielle quirked an eyebrow sceptically at that, noticing the openly murderous look on the Potions master's face as Lockhart talked.

"One—two—three—"

Both of them swung their wands towards the ceiling and brought them down to point at their opponent. Lockhart, predictably, did nothing, but Snape shouted, "_Expelliarmus!_" There was a bright flash of scarlet light that knocked Lockhart off his feet; he flew off the stage into the wall behind him and slid down it to the floor.

Arielle and Neville choked back laughter; Seamus, Dean, and Ginny didn't have quite as much control and fell over each other in hysterics. Only Star seemed worried about Lockhart's well-being and shot disapproving glares at her friends.

The Defence professor got unsteadily to his feet, looking dishevelled. "Well, there you have it!" he said as he got back onstage. "That was a Disarming Charm—as you see, I've lost my wand—ah, thank you, Miss Brown—" even from across the room, the look of superiority Lavender felt the need to send towards Arielle was clear as crystal, but Arielle just rolled her eyes as she didn't care much for the wannabe professor "—yes, an excellent idea to show them that, Professor Snape, but if you don't mind my saying so, it was very obvious what you were about to do. If I had wanted to stop you it would have been only too easy—however, I felt it would be instructive to let them see..."

Judging by the look on Snape's face, he _did_ mind Lockhart saying, and it seemed that Lockhart may have noticed, for he said, "Enough demonstrating! I'm going to come amongst you now and put you all into pairs. Professor Snape, if you'd like to help me—"

Lockhart reached the young Gryffindors at about the same time as Snape. Neville was paired with a boy from Hufflepuff that Arielle didn't know, but before Lockhart could start another pair, Snape partnered Ron with Seamus.

"Careful, Ron's wand is still malfunctioning," Arielle whispered to Seamus as he passed, and he grimaced.

Lockhart had paired Ginny with Star, and Arielle got paired with Dean as, luckily for her, Snape was still busy bullying Harry and Hermione. Unfortunately, that left Harry stuck with Malfoy and Hermione with a girl that looked to be more troll than witch. Arielle gave her a sympathetic look before turning to face Dean.

"Don't worry, I'll go easy on you," Dean teased.

Arielle laughed, "Yeah, right. Let's see how well that works out for you."

"Face your partners!" Lockhart called. "And bow!"

Arielle and Dean looked at each other and then cruelly mimicked Lockhart's previous display of hand twirling. Neither one of them was breathing with the effort to restrain their laughter.

"Wands at the ready!" Arielle took a steadying breath and raised her wand. "When I count to three, cast your charms to disarm you opponents—_only_ to disarm them—we don't want any accidents—one...two...three—"

"_Expelliarmus!_"

Both Arielle and Dean flew backwards as the other's spell hit them, but only Dean lost his wand. Arielle smacked her head on the floor as she landed, causing stars to burst in front of her eyes. She just laid on the ground wide-eyed for a moment before she acknowledged the sounds of a continued duel coming from somewhere behind her. Apparently, Harry and Malfoy had ignored the "disarm only" part of their directions and had launched into a full duel, or as full a duel as two Second Years could have.

"_Finite Incantatem!_" Snape cried.

Everything seemed to stop for a moment under the smoky green haze that hovered over the Great Hall. Arielle got up and looked around for Dean, who had gone to retrieve his wand looking defeated but otherwise perfectly fine. She noticed Ginny and Star in a similar position, both having to retrieve their wands after their face off. Neville was lying on the ground, panting but apparently unharmed. Seamus, however, was ashen-faced as Ron tried to hold him up and apologize for his backfiring wand. Arielle bit her lip in concern and caught his eye, mouthing, "What happened?" He just shook his head slightly and replied, "Later."

She watched as Harry pulled Hermione's partner off of her; the large girl had decided to forget disarming and physically attack Hermione. Arielle gingerly prodded the spot on the back of her head that had hit the floor; there was a lump already forming, but she wasn't bleeding.

"Dear, dear," Lockhart said as he moved through the crowd, surveying the aftermath. "Up you go, Macmillan... Careful there, Miss Fawcett... Pinch it hard, it'll stop bleeding in a second, Boot—

"I think I'd better teach you how to _block_ unfriendly spells," Lockhart said. He glanced at Snape but quickly turned away.

"Ace idea, professor, maybe we should have done that _before_ our mini-duels," Arielle said softly, rolling her eyes.

"Let's have a volunteer pair—Longbottom and Finch-Fletchley, how about you—"

"A bad idea, Professor Lockhart," Snape interjected. "Longbottom causes devastation with the simplest spells. We'll be sending what's left of Finch-Fletchley up to the hospital wing in a matchbox."

Arielle noticed Neville flush and her jaw clenched as she glared up at the Potions master. He had no right to constantly put students down. Moving forward slightly so she was next to Neville, she murmured, "Ignore him, he's not worth it."

"How about Malfoy and Potter?" Snape suggested.

"Excellent idea!" Lockhart exclaimed, gesturing for Harry and Malfoy to join him in the centre of the hall as the crowd backed away.

"Now, Harry, when Draco points his wand at you, you do _this_," Lockhart said, attempting a complicated wand motion that caused him to drop his wand. As he picked it up, he said, "Whoops—my wand is a little overexcited—"

Beside her, Seamus snorted in laughter. She hadn't noticed him come over. "You okay?" she whispered.

"Yeah, I was just knocked backwards pretty hard, but there was a lot of smoke coming from that stupid wand; it was pretty shocking," he whispered back.

Harry and Malfoy had turned to face each other. "Just do what I did, Harry," Lockhart was saying.

"What, drop my wand?" Harry replied, but he got no answer.

"Three—two—one—go!"

"_Serpensortia!_" Malfoy shouted.

Arielle watched wide-eyed as a large black snake shot out of the wand and fell to the floor. It raised itself, ready to strike.

"Don't move, Potter," Snape said, obviously enjoying Harry's fear. "I'll get rid of it..."

"Allow me!" Lockhart said, brandishing his wand. There was a loud bang and the snake, instead of vanishing, flew up into the air and fell to the floor heavily. Furious, it slithered over to the boy standing on the other side of Neville from Arielle.

Harry was moving towards the snake. A strange hissing sound was coming out of his mouth, and suddenly the snake stopped charging at Finch-Fletchley.

Arielle's jaw dropped and she stared at Harry in disbelief. It wasn't possible. It _shouldn't_ be possible. She didn't know what he had said because she didn't speak the language, but for all the world it seemed as if her brother had just spoken Parseltongue.

"What do you think you're playing at?" the boy shouted angrily before turning to storm out of the hall.

Snape moved forward to vanish the snake, and Ron went up and grabbed Harry's robes, leading him away quickly with Hermione. Arielle continued to stare as they left, not knowing what to do or say.

"Arielle...Arielle?" Seamus shook her shoulder gently and she snapped out of it, focusing on him instead. "We should probably go, come on."

Together they left the hall with Dean, Ginny, Star, and Neville. Neville looked at Arielle curiously. "Did you know Harry could talk to snakes?"

Arielle shook her head, frowning slightly. "I don't even know how he _can_ speak it. It's supposed to be hereditary, but I didn't understand him at all."

"Well, I guess this means no more duelling club," Seamus said, sounding only a little disappointed.

"Most likely, but we did learn one new spell. That's more than Lockhart's taught us all year," Arielle said, laughing slightly through her unease.

Back in the Gryffindor dormitory, Arielle lay awake for hours wondering how Harry could be a Parselmouth without her being one. In the end, she decided there was no point in worrying about it. One thing was certain to her, though: tomorrow was going to be a rough day.

**A/N: Happy Halloween, Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, New Year, and even birthday if I've missed that in the past six months! I'm so sorry it's been so long! Please don't throw things. This story is necessary, but I'm not all that into it. The next one will be better, promise :) Review, please :)**


	12. Chapter 11: Christmas

Sometimes, Arielle decided, she hated being right.

Over the past few months, she had grown used to people ignoring her, both intentionally and unintentionally. It didn't really bother her anymore—other than Lavender's attempts to shove her popularity in Arielle's face while pretending to not notice her—but she thought it would be nice if people didn't write her off for no reason.

Today, however, people were going out of their way to acknowledge her. Unfortunately, the events that transpired at the Duelling Club had become the talk of the school, and everyone had their own opinions on the matter. Arielle, as Harry's little sister, had gotten the school's attention nearly as much as Harry himself. If the students weren't asking her all sorts of questions about Harry being a Parseltongue and what he had said—since Arielle had been right, it was supposed to run in the family's blood—they were flinching away and avoiding her like the plague because the weirdo-misfit image that Lavender had created for her was beginning to strike true in the minds of her fellow students.

Lavender herself was taking great joy in stage whispering about Arielle whenever Arielle glanced past her and pretending to be terrified to be in the same room with the sister of the "heir of Slytherin."

After suffering through a breakfast of questions, false terror, and mocking, Arielle finally gave in and morphed her hair brown so she could avoid the same treatment in the hallways, ignoring Seamus' protests that she should ignore them and hold her head high, "because it's not like you know what happened anymore than they do, so eventually they'll just give up.".

Nevertheless, it was strangely comforting to fade into obscurity again, if only to travel the corridors to get to class. In class she went back to red to avoid awkward questions. She never believed she'd long for her unknown status again, but dealing with the accusatory and terrified attitudes of her classmates was wearying.

The attack on Justin Finch-Fletchley and Nearly-Headless Nick made the rest of the week even worse. People had started skirting around Harry, and whenever Arielle forgot to change her hair, she received much the same treatment, except taunting words accompanied the avoidance for her rather than the terrified silence Harry received.

"How shameful is it that the heir of Slytherin is a Gryffindor? Speaking to snakes is _our_ House's ability, not theirs," said Anita Chaisely, a first year Slytherin, to her friends in a carrying voice.

After a particularly bad Potions lesson, Arielle was already in a bad mood. _She's baiting you. Don't rise...don't rise..._

"Well, I suppose Slytherin wouldn't take him, anyway," Chaisely continued, "seeing as he's got half Mudblood running through his veins—"

"Shut _up_, Chaisely!" Arielle shouted, anger flaring within her chest. "Don't you _dare_ say anything bad about my family! Harry is _not_ the heir of Slytherin, not that you believe he is, anyway. And that kind of language makes you sound ignorant, not superior." Arielle's angry eyes bored into Chaisely's now scared ones. The Slytherin scurried off with her friends. Arielle, not bothering to look back at the wide-eyed students who had watched the altercation, stormed off to get ready for dinner.

It was a show of holding her head high that would've made Seamus proud. Now, at least the awful comments in the hallway had stopped. After hearing about her "terribly explosive temper," people treated her with the same fear as they had been treating Harry.

On the bright side, she could leave her hair dark red again.

More often, Arielle hated when Ginny was right.

Why did teachers have to be so perceptive? Why did Percy have to be such a prat? And why did term not end one day sooner so she would have been safe from both for another two weeks?

"It's not a big deal, Perce!" Arielle argued for what felt like the thousandth time. "I can see fine! It's not like I'm walking into walls or—" _or tripping down the stairs_, she added ironically to herself, catching the lie before it hurt her argument "—or anything. Just because words on the chalkboard are a little bit blurry when I'm too far away from them doesn't mean—"

"You are getting glasses, Arielle. I'm not going to argue over it anymore," said Percy, cutting across words he had grown tired of pretending to hear. "I've already written to mother about it, and you are having your eyes checked tomorrow by Madam Pomfrey. There's a chance this could interfere with your studies, and that's not a risk you should take so lightly."

Arielle glared him down, angered to a threatening silence. Percy seemed to sense this as he said, "You are blowing this way out of proportion, and maybe after a year or so with the glasses you can start on eye potions and not have to wear them again." When this didn't appease her, he just left her alone in the common room.

He was right, the glasses were most likely not forever, but she still didn't see why he was putting her through this. It seemed so unfair that after everything that had happened in the past few months, her vision was beginning to abandon her as well. She highly doubted the school's selection of frames would be anywhere near as trendy as some of the ones on the celebrities that littered the covers of other girl's _Teen Witch Weekly'_s, too. She could practically hear Brown's and Chaisely's scathing comments.

Feeling destined to live out her Hogwarts days on the outside looking in, Arielle made her way to the Great Hall for the final meal of term. It was likely to be the last time she saw her friends before the end of the holidays. Ignoring the whispers and sidelong glances, she sat at the Gryffindor table across from Seamus and Dean.

"That's not a happy look," Seamus said, frowning. "What's the diagnosis, then?"

"Percy's a prat, and I'm doomed to jibes about glasses as well as the Heir of Slytherin and red hair," Arielle sighed.

"Aw, cheer up, that's hardly a death sentence, and it's practically the holidays!" Seamus said. "There was never anything to do about Percy's condition, and glasses can't be the worst thing in the world. You love Christmas! Smile, start envisioning sugar plums and ginger bread houses and what have you, and let the rest settle out."

Arielle smiled in spite of herself. "I'm obviously failing you two as the optimist if you have to go giving me speeches like that," she laughed even as she started to feel better.

"If it helps, I promise to tease you mercilessly about the glasses," Dean deadpanned.

Arielle shot him a sardonic look. "Thanks, Dean. I knew I could count on you."

They were soon joined by Star, and it wasn't long until Arielle's mood lightened considerably from both friendship and holiday spirit. Joking aside, she knew Seamus was right. Glasses weren't going to be the end of the world, and even if they were, she'd just face them down like she had to. What else was a Gryffindor girl to do?

After dinner was finished, Arielle made sure to say goodbye to her friends in the common room before heading to the dormitory for the night since she knew it was likely she would sleep through their departures. She would rather be going to the Burrow to spend Christmas with the Weasleys and meet Bill than stay at Hogwarts and fail her eye examination, but she saw no point in dragging out the misery.

Cursing her ability to sleep like the dead for inordinate amounts of time, Arielle sprinted down to the hospital wing as fast as possible without tripping over herself, a feat she found was much easier in jeans than the uniform skirt and robes. She slid into the wing just as a distant clock chimed half two. Right on time. She _hated _being late.

"Ah, Miss Potter, good," Madam Pomfrey said. "If you would please come over here, this shouldn't take very long."

Arielle crossed nervously to the indicated cot and sat at the edge, wondering what she'd have to do. From what she knew of Muggle eye exams, you had to read a few letters from a chart and the Healer could tell what lenses you needed. It sounded like a lot of guesswork to her, but it seemed to work well enough. She had also heard about drops that expanded a person's pupils to all kinds of abnormal sizes and they had to keep their eyes covered for long periods of time before they went back to normal. Suppressing a shudder at the thought of such medieval methods, Arielle desperately hoped she wouldn't have to do something similar.

Madam Pomfrey placed a pair of frames with what looked like plain glass lenses in front of Arielle. The girl groaned inwardly, knowing without knowing how that these would be her glasses. The frames for the lenses were huge and rounded, slightly flattened at the top, and there were little extensions on either side where the legs attached to the rest of the frame. They were, in a word, geeky, and Arielle was almost relieved that she could say she'd had no choice in the matter.

"The lenses are enchanted to increase in strength until you see clearly, and the frames will adjust to fit your face appropriately. They will continue to adjust as you grow, should you keep them long enough to necessitate such adjustments." Arielle strongly doubted she would, but kept that thought to herself. "Let me know when the lenses are finished. You can see what the glasses look like in the mirror over there, if you wish."

With growing trepidation, Arielle took the glasses over to the mirror and put them on. At first, they threatened to fall off her ears or slip off her nose, but the frames quickly shrunk to fit her head. The black frames couldn't have been more than three millimetres thick, and Arielle was more than a little surprised to see that the large-lens'd frames fit her small nose and large hazel eyes better than her brother's round spectacles would have. She acknowledged the irony that these glasses fit her face, even with the overtly large lenses. Both she and the glasses were apparently not designed to be 'normal.'

A greater shock came when her vision began rapidly clearing without warning, and her eyes grew wide with surprise. The right one finished only a little before the left, and Arielle blinked, looking around at the sharpened features of the hospital wing. It was bizarre and nearly made her eyes ache, but she couldn't stop looking at her crystal clear surroundings.

"Should I take that to mean they're done?" Madam Pomfrey asked, striding over briskly to check on her eye patient. She tapped her wand on the frames and they glowed silver for a moment before settling back to black. "There, they will keep at that strength until the next time you have them checked, which I suggest you do at the beginning of the next academic year. I'll record the prescriptions for both lenses so I have them on file, but I won't give you the numbers until next year. I don't want you using them to get the eye potions for at least a year, your eyes will need to adjust to seeing properly through lenses first.

"Now, I recommend you use the holiday period to get your eyes accustomed to seeing clearly. Wear those glasses for a few hours daily, and increase the time daily. By the start of winter term, you should be able to wear them all day without strain. Should you not wear them all the time, as many children are wont to do, I would recommend you wear them every time you read and write, especially if it takes more than ten minutes. You are slightly nearsighted, so these are not reading glasses, but doing so will keep your vision from deteriorating too quickly. Any questions?"

Arielle shook her head and was dismissed from the hospital wing after receiving her glasses case. After debating whether to bite the bullet and go to the common room to face the twins' jibes at her quirky lenses, Arielle dismissed the idea in favour of visiting the Marauder's Pass.

_It's dreadfully boring when you aren't here, _Padfoot said the moment she traced the M in the Marauders' crest. _Just so you know_.

"I'm sorry, things have gone mad in the school recently, though," Arielle said. "The Heir of Slytherin has attacked two students, a cat, and Nearly-Headless Nick, and no one knows what to think anymore."

_But the Heir of Slytherin is a legend_, Moony said, sounding confused. _All the textbooks show—_

Arielle shook her head, still unsure if they could see her or not. "Apparently it's not a myth. Anything that can do that to a _ghost_ is just..." She shuddered.

_Ooh, Moony's beloved textbooks were wrong_, Prongs laughed. _And what happened to the victims? If students were dead, they'd close the school. You said Nick was attacked, too._

"You're right, no one's dead—well, except Nick, but that's centuries-old news—but Colin and Justin are petrified, so is Mrs. Norris, and Nick looks very charred and solid and completely unresponsive. The school's one attack away from frenzied terror." Arielle decided against mentioning that the majority of the student body blamed Harry. There was no sense in unduly upsetting her memory-friends.

_There are many ways to petrify people and animals, but I've never heard of anything that could cause harm to a ghost_, Moony said thoughtfully.

_Yeah, but this monster deserves some credit for taking out Mrs. Norris_, Prongs said.

_I swear she had it out for me_, Padfoot said. _Maybe they should "accidentally" leave her under when they revive the others._

_They can revive them, right?_ Moony asked.

"They think so. Professor Sprout's growing Mandrakes for the potion now. And while I agree that leaving Mrs. Norris under would be a public service, I can't see it happening."

_Pity_, Padfoot said. _She'd make such an unlovely wall ornament._

It was an hour before Arielle took the Pass up to the seventh floor and went back to the common room. As she expected, Fred and George made jokes, Ron laughed, Harry and Hermione were nice about the glasses, and Percy hardly looked up from yet another of his letters. _One of these days, I'm going to figure out why he's always busy writing letters,_ Arielle thought. _It can't be to his parents or they wouldn't need the rest of us to write. Still, it's odd behaviour, even for him…_

Arielle was sure that Christmas morning had been beautiful—she had slept right through it, but that only increased its beauty in her mind. After eating a lunch in bed consisting of about a quarter of the sweets and treats she had received, she donned the sweater Mrs. Weasley had made for her and trooped down the stairs to join her brothers in their festivities

After taking part in what felt like the greatest snowball war ever conducted on Hogwarts grounds—Fred, Ginny, and Harry against George, Arielle, and Ron, complete with ice forts and enchanted snow grenades—the group moved inside to warm up and dry off before dinner.

The Great Hall looked magnificent with twelve decorated Christmas trees behind the head table and floating fairy lights and ribbons of holly and mistletoe decorating the walls and ceiling. Enchanted snow fell from the ceiling as Dumbledore led the remaining students and faculty in singing some of his favourite carols. Arielle happily joined in, knowing that even if she sang loudly like she wanted, Hagrid's booming voice would still drown her out. She had not felt this happy in a while, just surrounded by her extensive family who was acting normally for the first time in months—as normal as they ever were with the twins charming Percy's badge to read "Pinhead" and Percy huffily demanding to know what everyone was snickering at.

Stuffed with Christmas dinner and pudding, Arielle was lounging in her favourite armchair by the fire and had almost dozed off when Harry and Ron returned to the common room looking slightly worried.

"Hey guys, you're back late," Arielle slurred through a repressed yawn. "Where's Hermione?"

The two boys exchanged a quick look before Harry said, "She's in the Hospital Wing. A spell backfired and Madam Pomfrey's taking care of it."

_A spell backfired on _Hermione_? _Arielle thought. "Is she okay? That's not like her…"

"She's going to be fine, she just misunderstood what the textbook was saying," Harry said, looking uncomfortable.

Not understanding why he was lying to her, but not able to prove it either, Arielle contented herself with knowing that Hermione would be okay since she could not force Harry or Ron to tell her what really happened. Sometimes she just had to trust that they knew what they were doing, even if it did not always work out.

**A/N: SORRY IT'S BEEN LIKE 2 YEARS! I've graduated high school and started college and gotten a new laptop and a million other things since the last time...life has been crazy and I keep telling myself I'm going to keep writing since it's basically all planned out in my head, but I just haven't managed to do it. That being said, I wrote half of this 2 years ago and half of it tonight, I didn't see much that needed to be changed but I know that it's not the best writing ever. I'll work on it. Thanks to wwpd for reviewing and telling me that I needed to update in the next two months, you kicked me into gear. I can't promise updates will be frequent, but hopefully no more 2 year gaps!**


End file.
